Wrong Side of the Briar Patch
by T.S. Blue
Summary: It's a summer of freedom and hardship, of love and calamities. Daisy and Bo have just graduated into adulthood and Luke is back from war. It ought to be the best time of their lives, but one disaster follows another. Who would want the Dukes hurt? Prequel, rated T for language and violence. Complete.
1. The End and the Beginning

_**Author's Note:** This story has a couple of origins. One was from a dream I had, probably close to a year ago. The other, far more important origin, was a discussion I had with i1976 - Blu Notte some time back. Her view of Daisy's character arc struck me, because I am not entirely fair to Daisy much of the time. I don't see her as clearly as I see the boys. But having discussed Daisy's character arc during the series (especially in relation to Enos) I found myself wondering why Daisy and Enos started as they did in the series._

 _So here's a prequel, which has a greater emphasis on Daisy and Enos than my usual stories, but is really centered on the Duke family as a whole, and their unique relationship with the law._

 _So, special thanks to i1976 - Blu Notte for making me think differently about characters that I've been writing for a long time now. And thanks to all who have read and supported my stories over the years._

* * *

 **One: The End... and the Beginning**

 _November 30, 1974_

She wasn't much for looking back. The childhood loss of her parents saw to that – there wasn't much in her past that was easy to think about and no amount of daydreaming about those that were gone could bring them back or make them real again. So she faced firmly forward and generally figured that life was fairly bright there. In her future, where anything could happen. Good things, because there was no point in predicting bad things.

Late autumn had settled in thick, with low-hanging fog that never moved or lifted, just made its damp way under any jacket she might wear. Tangled itself through her hair and left it half-curled and unmanageable, got breathed in and chilled her from the inside out, and it was on those bitter mornings that limped their way toward cold afternoons and icy evenings that she could feel it still, sometimes. The warmth of his fingers woven between hers, the tickle of breath in her ear as all the fevered dreams of a lifetime got whispered there.

But that was the past. Not as far back as her lost parents were. Not even as far back as the flavor of champagne that had been offered up in shallow splashes at the bottom of cheap stemware during the class of 1974's graduation party last spring. Not as far back as the first sweaty heat wave of June or the rustle of a forgetful breeze making its way through the early-summer tassels of summer corn. Not even as far back as that impulsive haircut that she'd gotten to fend off the dog days and had hated every day since she'd gone and done it, even now that it was almost long enough to touch her shoulders again.

The last time Enos had touched her with anything like warmth and affection felt like yesterday. Felt like a hundred years ago.

It was exactly one hundred nineteen days, two hours and a thirty minutes ago (plus or minus five minutes) and she wished with everything she ever was or ever would be that she could turn around and find herself back there, or even better, back before the whole bittersweet summer even properly began.

* * *

 _June 8, 1974_

For Daisy, it started at the annual carwash fundraiser. Every year, Hazzard High's senior class bilked the townsfolk out of a few dollars in spare change so they could scrape together enough cash for a bus trip to Atlanta to celebrate their upcoming graduation. One last time to have fun together before they had to get serious (or get married, as more than one class couple was planning to do) and settle down. Or ship off – some to the military and others to college, but that had been too much to think about right then, when they still had two weeks before any of that could happen.

Standing in the high school parking lot, sun burning into the skin that was exposed around the baggy, belt-cinched, cut-off shorts (that had been Luke's jeans back when he was about twelve and had been too threadbare at the knees to be passed down to either of his younger cousins until she'd cut off the legs) and the tank top that gave her about as much shape as a flagpole. Her hair, frizzy with the humidity, hung down her back in a girlish ponytail and she had suds stuck to her in odd clumps here and there. A wad of bills in her pocket as she greeted folks she'd known all her life, took whatever cash they offered her and pointed off to the right where a dozen or so girls wearing even less than she was were wielding hoses and commanding the few boys that had agreed to come out and help. Standing on their toes and showing off any curves they might have as they pointed out dirt on roofs and smashed bug carcasses on windshields for the boys to scrub at with their rags and sponges.

Right about then, with her hand on her hip and her head turned to yell at Bo for flinging a soapy rag at her for about the fourteenth time that morning, the summer started. Though it was technically still spring, and she was pretty sure no one else counted the summer by that particular day. Bo probably thought it started with graduation itself, since he'd only been waiting for the day with no amount of patience since sometime in about the second grade. Jesse probably counted it by the first dry spell that lasted long enough for them to have to get water out to the fields, and for Luke it was probably the fire. But for her it started when she turned back from her hollering to greet the next customer and got caught up in the sweetest grin she'd ever seen. Apple cheeks pulling up the corners of stretched lips to show a row of perfect white teeth. And above that, bright eyes that were focused tightly on her, like she was the only thing worth looking at on such a beautiful, blue-sky morning.

"Hi, Daisy," he said, voice raised just enough to be heard over the rumble of the car's engine. It wasn't much of anything as far as cars went, just a tan, boxy Ford that looked like it had been washed just yesterday. Nothing more than a light coating of dust over the paint and there was no way to drive from one side of Hazzard to the other without gathering at least that much. (Which was part of what made this annual fundraiser ridiculous, and yet people came and got their cars washed at it every year anyway.) "All I got is two dollars. Reckon that's enough?"

"Enos!" she said and her voice sounded every bit as high and breathy as a little girl exclaiming over a puppy. Which was silly, it was just Enos Strate, the same boy that had played basketball with her cousins, back when they all had short legs and big teeth that were still growing together in the middle. He never had been able to run and dribble at the same time, so he'd mostly been the one who stood under the basket and waited for the ball to be passed to him. "I ain't seen you in a dog's age!"

And he'd – grown wasn't the right word; he couldn't be less than twenty-one now and his growing years were behind him. But he'd changed. Maybe his shoulders had broadened, though it was hard to tell, squinting into the shadows of a car. Maybe it was the wideness of his chin or the slight shadowing there that hinted at the need to shave a little more closely, or maybe it was just in that smile. The tilt of his face upward to see her instead of down in shyness, the confident grip of his right hand on the steering wheel that suggested a man who knew how to handle a vehicle as well as the next guy. (And considering that the next guy closest to them was probably Bo, that was a lot of handling.)

Enos' hand – his hand, she'd been so busy assessing his smile and his chin and his shoulders that she'd forgotten to even notice that his left hand was hanging out the window, brown and tan plaid sleeve rolled up to his elbow – waving in the air a bit to get her to respond. To remember, even, that she'd been asked something.

"Two dollars is plenty," she assured him. Took his money, crammed it into her pocket with the rest of what she'd collected that morning and thought maybe she should ask him where he'd been, why she hadn't seen him in – could it be a year? More than that? Hard to say when he'd graduated three years ago and without the four walls of school to contain them she couldn't swear she'd seen him since. (But she must have. It couldn't be three years.)

Didn't matter what she might have wanted to say or ask when he smiled again. Not quite as confident or relaxed.

"Best you duck, Daisy," he suggested.

Duck? Why would she—

And Enos' smile got just that much wider, looked strained like maybe he was pulling muscles somewhere between his cheeks and ears, and his eyebrows popped up like there were strings tugging at them.

"What?" she said, but by then it was too late. Cold water on her legs, her back and up into her hair and there was nothing to do but whirl around and holler. "Bo!" And get squirted in the face.

And that was how the summer started, with her standing in the high school parking lot, dressed like somebody's kid brother, hollering at her hose-wielding cousin and soaked to the skin while Enos Strate smiled and secretly, silently worked his way into her heart and mind and soul. And he hadn't seen fit to leave any of those spaces since.


	2. Torture on a Time Delay

_**Author's Note:** Sorry for the delay in posting this chapter. I try not to let it go this long, but the week was truly insane!_

 _Just a quick note on the timeframe - since this is a prequel (and for the longest time that was what it was called in my files, simply: The Prequel) not everyone will be exactly who they are in the series. This awkward sentence (brought to you by my crazy week and the letter M) will make itself clear a little later in this chapter._

* * *

 **Two: Torture on a Time Delay**

 _June 29, 1974_

Times weren't, Bo had been made to understand, anywhere near as wild as they had been when Jesse was younger. When their uncle did the delivering for the family, at least some of the time. Back in the days when you couldn't spit to your left or your right without hitting at least one other moonshiner, maybe two or three, and half of them were crazy and ornery to boot. When competition was thick and mean and bore names like Black Jack and the Reaper and Poison Ivy, and the revenuers were the least of your problems.

"Luke," he said, because he'd been driving since he was thirteen, delivering for nearly a year and he was a fine driver. A natural. All of Hazzard agreed that no one could handle a car better. "There's got to be four of them." But he wasn't schemer, wasn't sly or slick, and being outnumbered like he and his older cousin were, after midnight, on a narrow road dipping down into Black Hollow at high speed without headlights, he needed a survival plan.

Luke turned to look over the boxes of their wares and out the back window of _Tilly_ , the family's solid but nimble 'shine running car.

"Six," he corrected.

Scratch that, they needed a miracle.

"Six cars?" His voice squeaked, though he was almost eighteen and long past the days when it should have. "Where did Joe get them all?" The Federal Bureau of Alcohol, Tobacco and Firearms was no backwater excuse for law enforcement; it was a force to be reckoned with. And Agent Joe Higgins, who had been working the tri-county region for the last couple of years, was like a dog after a bone when it came to chasing down moonshiners. Still, that dog usually hunted on his own or with a couple of others that might include a Hazzard County Sheriff and a hastily sworn-in deputy, not in a large pack.

"Don't matter where they came from, it's where they end up that counts. Head for the swamp, Bo."

It was awfully early in the game for that, Bo felt. Or should have been. They were supposed to be climbing into the hills to Wigley's Mountain and over Taylor Ridge, but all those roads were switchback trails without even a guardrail alongside them and with that many pursuers—

Times weren't what they had been, when Jesse had to outrun not only revenuers and local law, but also had to fend off other moonshiners that could be territorial and mean. A man had to cut his own path through the hills, find his own customers without stepping on too many toes, but when your product was a pure and sweet as Jesse's the clientele just about came knocking at the old farmhouse door.

Still, the screech of his tires and smell of burnt rubber – as he took the hairpin turn off Ridge Road to careen down Bluestone Quarry Drive – told him that times were bad enough.

"Luke," he said, daring a glance into his rearview mirror. They had rules, the Duke cousins did. He and Luke drove as a team, with Bo's eyes always on the road in front and Luke's everywhere else. Except he never had been able to fully submit to that philosophy. (And Luke did his own share of cheating by reaching for the steering wheel from time to time, when he was supposed to keep his hands to himself.) "Ain't you got no better ideas?"

Luke probably snorted, must have offered up a smirk. There was no light to see him in and no time to look, but it was a cinch to guess. The pool of Luke's responses to Bo's helpful suggestions was pretty darn shallow.

"Reckon I would," came the answer, edged with sarcasm. "If you wasn't driving like a turtle." That was an insult to his honor and his skill as a Duke. And tough talk coming from a man that had been relegated to side-seat driving for close to a year. Luke wouldn't admit it, but Bo was better than him. "You'd do a mite better," his smug older cousin counseled. "If you hadn't been out partying all night last night."

"It wasn't all night." But a proud smile tugged at the corner of his lips at the memory. Of the party in the thick woods off Potter's Road, the bonfire and the cassette tapes playing, the dancing and drinking someone's smuggled-in moonshine that didn't hold a candle to Jesse's. Of the way Nellie Robinson's shirt had stuck to her skin with sweat after she'd been dancing for a while, and the way the two of them had found some deep shadows to spend a little private time in. "Besides, you was there, too." And that might have been the best part, celebrating with Luke.

His and Daisy's graduation, which had been forever in coming. Luke was three years ahead of them, and his legacy had been a thing of beauty. The troublemaker who'd never been caught, the menace that teachers still flinched about years later when they met Bo. The epitome of what the old-timers meant when they said families like the Dukes were from the wrong side of the briar patch. It would have been hard enough to live up to Luke. But for almost his whole twelve years of schooling, Daisy had been right there in the same grade as him. Five months older than him, sitting in all the same classrooms as him since she'd moved into the Duke farm late in their first grade year. She was quiet, respectful, attentive, bookwormish and if that wasn't bad enough, she'd gotten good grades. Teachers weren't sure whether to punish Bo for not being half the student his girl cousin was, or just be relieved that he wasn't nearly the terror that his male cousin had been. Too many years spent in too many shadows, and about the only good thing he could say of them was that they were finally over.

And that Luke, who never missed an opportunity to say an unkind word about how Bo was still a kid, had for once treated him like an equal. Had come to the graduation last Saturday evening and offered up a wink when Bo went to claim his diploma. Had joined him at the "official" party at the Boar's Nest, where the graduates were offered a sip of champagne each, and told by all the town elders to go out into the world and make something of themselves. And finally, a few days after pomp and circumstance was done, Luke had accompanied him to the "unofficial" party and told him to have fun. Had said to do what he wanted because even if he was still more than a month away from eighteen, he was a grownup now.

Even though Bo had no clear plans to behave like any kind of adult at all. Heck, there was no reason to, just as there had been no reason (other than the ongoing threat of a whipped hide from Uncle Jesse and a lifetime of taunting from Luke) to finish school. He didn't need to know trigonometry to run moonshine, and he didn't need to put on a suit or otherwise give up his wild ways, either. Besides, the Marines had grown Luke up enough for the both of them.

"I wasn't drinking like moonshine was going out of style. And watch that—" _tree_ , but Luke never got there; he was too busy ducking low toward the dashboard, like that was going to do him any good at all. Low was as bad as high if they hit anything at the speed they were going. But Bo had no intentions of hitting anything, least of all a silly tree. He swerved, skidded, felt _Tilly_ lurch to one side before settling to the middle again, and careened down the old dirt fire road that offered a more direct descent than the paved switchback road. "Or dancing," Luke mumbled, as he went looking the dignity he'd left under the dashboard, "with everything in a skirt."

Which only went to prove he'd done more than his share of growing up and Bo didn't need to do any at all.

"You're just mad because I ain't hungover."

"I ain't hungover neither." Of course Luke wasn't. He'd just admitted that he'd hardly touched the liquor last night. Which was good, since it had been his oldest cousin that watched out for him and Daisy through the night, made sure that all their fun was of the good and clean sort, then brought them safely home.

"All of them can't be revenuers," Bo pointed out, catching another quick look at the pursuing cars in his rearview mirror.

"No kidding," Luke answered back. "Keep your eyes on the—path." Because calling it a road would be too generous.

"No, I mean, they ain't all law," Bo clarified. Because sure, scrawny Joe Higgins could scrape together a small posse under dire circumstances (which these didn't precisely qualify as, if you asked Bo) but not a one of them should have been able to make that turn onto the fire road. And he and Luke still more tails than a nest full of possums. "Maybe ain't none of them law." Since it seemed they'd all come along for this part of the ride.

"And that's," came Luke's smug explanation, "why we're going to the swamp. Now put your foot on it."

For once, Bo didn't have much of a clever answer, so he did as he was told.

* * *

It wasn't, Luke figured somewhere around the time he realized that Maudine had thrown a shoe _again_ , going to be his day. Not that the shoe was the worst of it, just one more hassle to pile on top of the others.

A pile that was already stacked thick and high with last night's moonshine-run-turned-fox-hunt, where he and Bo were the quarry. The swamp hadn't been enough to shake all of their pursuers, which went to prove that at least three of them had not been the law. The whole bunch had been blacked out and some of them had been lost early, but a number had made it to the edge of the swamp and then the last three had dogged him and Bo until finally they dumped their wares into the water (and there had to be some dizzy gators in there this morning) to lighten their burden. Then and only then had they lost the last three.

Afterward, they'd had to come home to Jesse, tails tucked and Bo's head down, expecting they'd get whipped like naughty pups. But when they'd told their tale, there hadn't been any yelling. Just a strange reflected glow of the last embers of the fireplace in Jesse face, a hollow look and they'd been sent to bed. It was, after all, only a couple of hours until chores, and there was no extra rest for farm-boys-by-day, (failed) delivery-boys-by-night. Besides, Daisy was already sleeping, so the house had to stay quiet.

Luke'd had the audacity to hope that he and Bo had gotten off easy. But it was just torture on a time delay.

Waking up was to the tune of a thunderclap, and early chores were wet and mud-slicked. Breakfast was bland oatmeal, because the eggs had to go to town to be sold in the general store. After all, there was no cash in the house when 'shine ran through the county's creeks instead of customers' livers. A lull in the rain seemed like relief and he and Bo had gone back to the barn to get serious about the day's work, putting Maudine out to pasture while they cleaned her stall. The goats were making nuisances of themselves, but eventually Jesse came along to take them out to be milked.

Luke had almost deemed the day salvageable when he went back out to check on Maudine and found that she'd been using the fence as a handy shoe-removal tool again, and while he'd been checking booth her hoof and the fence for damage, there'd been that engine hum that let him know that there was nothing about this day that was going to be any good.

"What's he doing here?" Bo asked from where he wasn't quite doing his share of chores. Sitting on a hay bale and studying the blade and handle of a shovel as if he were going to fix it, which might have been halfway convincing if it had been broken in the first place.

The engine ran far too smooth, was tuned and tinkered with and otherwise cared for with far too much money to be any friend of theirs. To be anyone other than Jefferson Davis Hogg, business owner, land broker, casual moonshiner and one-time partner of Jesse Duke. Though that last one never had rung completely true to him and Bo; as long as they'd lived in the farmhouse, hardly a civil word had been spoken about the man within its four walls.

"What's he doing anywhere?" Luke answered back. "Come on, help me with Maudine and we can go find out."

"Why, hello there, Beauregard, Lukas," they found themselves being greeted when they made their way toward the porch, where old J.D. and his stinky cigar were holding court. Making grad gestures with his pudgy little arms while ashes fell over the cracked floorboards and it was a good thing they'd been subjected to the morning's thundery deluge, otherwise the fool might be starting a hundred tiny fires. Preaching whatever was on his mind today to Jesse's impassive face, to the chickens in the farmyard, to the goats tied to the post, and to the birds in the trees. To anyone who might listen, on purpose or accidentally. "How are you this fine morning?"

"That's just Bo," his cousin reminded them all (but J.D. in particular) for the hundredth time. The thousandth, but it was so much wasted breath as far as Hogg was concerned. In one ear and out the other because he wasn't listening and would call them each whatever struck his fancy on any given day. Today, apparently, was of a formal nature. J.D. was dressed for church, even if it was only Saturday, complete with gold braiding on his boots and hat, and a three piece white suit everywhere in between.

"Ah, there's the future of this fine county," he remarked, voice wavering with conjured emotion, cigar pointing squarely at Bo, whose dirty hands were in the pockets of his dirty jeans, dirty boots squelching in mud as he took those last few steps to the porch. Hair in messy ringlets around his face, eyes squinted down with suspicion or distaste (a look that never did sit well on Bo's pretty features), mouth twisted with whatever objections he was set to make. "Just as I'm always saying, we are only as strong as our youngsters' backs, only as smart as our children's schooling, only as fine as…" there was something about china in there, oats and mules, the plough and the hoe, the sword with which to do battle. All things that one Jefferson Davis Hogg would know nothing about, his soft, pink hands stained only by nicotine, his back bent only because of the impressive weight he hauled around his midsection. Not that it mattered a bit. He was practicing some sort of speech, and the Dukes were practicing ignoring his every word.

"You are of voting age, ain't you, boy?" brought them back from where they'd drifted to. _Boy_ was either him or Bo, and the answer depended which one he was asking.

"J.D.," Jesse interrupted before they could get around to figuring that out. "What was it you came here for? I know it wasn't Bo there's vote, because I reckon that when that boy turns eighteen," which would be about a month before the upcoming election, "he'll vote his conscience."

Those words dangled for a bit, waiting to be understood, then just went and flew right over J.D.'s head all the same. The man was running for commissioner of Hazzard County, and he'd been shuffling from here to there making sure everyone knew it. Making promises that he'd be better than Commissioner Chadwick ever hoped to be, but it was a moot point. Chadwick had been around since Jesse was slim and handsome and playing the field for a fine filly of a wife, and he didn't have too many marbles left by now. Hardly ever showed up in the courthouse, but he was loved. It would all come down to whether Hazzard wanted a sweetheart of a doddering old man, or someone halfway competent, but crookeder than old Withlacoochee River. Luke wasn't sure which way he wanted it to go.

"J.D.?" Jesse nudged.

"You're right Jesse," Hogg said, taking a long draw on his cigar and letting the smoke out slow. Stealing extra seconds, because the man was a thief and wanted everything he could get from his prospective constituents, even if all they had was time. "I ain't here for Bo's vote. I'm here to help you out."

"Help me out," Jesse mumbled, pushing himself up off the porch railing he'd been leaning on. Rolling his eyes in that way that called Hogg a precious fool without even saying a word. Bo sauntered up to the top step of the porch, and Luke held to the farmyard. Hogg was neatly surrounded by suspicious Dukes. "Just how, exactly, were you planning to do that?"

"Well, now, Jesse," J.D. simpered. Smacked his lips together and all but closed his eyes because what he was about to say was so delicious that they should all take the time to savor it. "I thought I'd just take this little piece of property off your hands, since it don't grow nothing but rocks," funny how that made Bo take a step forward. Towering over the fool that would impugn the land of his ancestors. "And corn. And corn, well it ain't worth what it once was, is it?" A conspiratorial wink and another pull on his cigar. "I'll pay good money, more than it's worth."

"What's that supposed to mean?" Bo demanded before Luke could finish climbing the steps to get next to him. Taking hold of his arm just above the elbow a second too late and Bo shook him off with the impatience of a toddler.

"Bo," Jesse said, just that quiet little syllable and it was enough. Bo's head dipped and a _yes, sir_ was implied. He'd be polite to the guests, but only because he valued his hind end and didn't want it whipped. "What Mr. Hogg may be referring to is that back when he and I were in business, corn sold differently." Leaving up to the imagination what he meant by that, because the Dukes had run 'shine back when Jesse was young and they still ran it now. The only difference was, now it had to be a secret. None of them could admit out loud what they did in heavily wooded hollows between jagged peaks of mountains, or why they drove so fast in the dark. Not since the revenuers had taken special interest in Hazzard County about a quarter century back. "At least during prohibition," which was when Duke corn liquor had sold for the highest price, historically speaking. "But that don't make no never mind. We sold as much Duke land as we ever aim to, back in the Great Depression," he added pointedly.

"You sure about that, Jesse?" J.D. smirked back at him. "Because I'd give you a fair price. Why, I'm willing to offer you a hundred fifty dollars an acre—"

"A hundred fifty; you've got to be out of your—" there was no holding Bo back that time. Not that it mattered what he was saying because Jesse was hollering just as loud. Luke left them to it, folding his arms across his chest. He was halfway interested in what the fat man had to say, but he was also perfectly willing to let him get yelled at for as long as Jesse wanted to do it. Figured the old man might even run out of steam before he finally got around to trying to lecture his boys for last night's poor showing on the road.

"It's a fine offer, Jesse, special for a friend like you. See, this old farm ain't worth much and you're getting older now. I reckon that money would let you retire. And it'd get these kids of yours off to a solid start. They wouldn't have to spend their whole lives scratching at dirt that ain't never going to produce no real crop, like you done and like your daddy done before you."

"Now just you wait a dang minute," Bo started up again, or kept going. Luke couldn't swear he'd ever really stopped. Just this time, it was accompanied by a finger leveled in J.D.'s face. "This dirt's better than any other you can find in Hazzard, and what would you know about dirt anyway when you ain't never grown nothing bigger than your own belly?"

"Bo!"

Chin jutted, Bo tried to stare their uncle down. To tell him silently that J.D. Hogg didn't deserve their civility, and in the end he failed. Blond bangs falling into his eyes, he dropped his hand to smack against his leg and let his head dip. _Yes, sir._

Luke released his arms from their fold, dropped one across Bo's shoulders. _I agree with him,_ the gesture said, or at least he hoped it did. _Even if I'm too smart to go mouthing off about it._

"Now, J.D., I apologize for what my youngster just said to you there. But I reckon it's time you was taking leave of us. We got chores to do and since we ain't selling—don't you waste your breath interrupting me now—we ain't selling this land, we'd best set to taking care of it."

"All right," Hogg agreed, still cheerful despite the fact that he'd been insulted or snubbed by everyone that stood on the porch (and just look at that, Daisy had come to the door and was glowering out through the screen at him, too). "Just remember I offered."

* * *

 _June 30, 1974_

There was no air in his office. None at all, just sweat, and that was before his unwanted guest showed up with his meticulous suit and his acrid cigar. Then there was less than no air, a dizzying concept. Like negative numbers learned at a school desk all those years ago. Rosco never had much liked math, but that year they learned negative numbers had been the worst. That was when he realized you could have less than zero and he hadn't cared for a lick of school after that.

Any more than he cared for a visit from Jefferson Davis Hogg.

"Well hello, Rosco. How are things in the sheriff's department these days?"

He was friendly enough, at least on the surface. Personable, and it was only polite to inquire after a man's job after all. It was just that when J.D. Hogg asked questions, it boded well to answer carefully.

The man came around for two reasons, and two reasons only. The first was to collect money and the second was to remind anyone who might need reminding that he owned just about everything that there was to own in this town. If he didn't own one house, he owned the one next door and he could just decide to build an extension right up to the property line or get the zoning changed and turn it into a parking lot. Whichever suited him at any point and that meant everyone ought to jump when he told them to, because he could make lives miserable at the slightest provocation.

He didn't own Rosco's little one-bedroom house in town, but the one in which his mother and sister Lulu lived was a different story. An antebellum on Ash Street with columns in front and high ceilings. It was split into four apartments, one of which his mother and Lulu shared. Paid for from Rosco's paycheck, straight into J.D. Hogg's bank account because whatever inheritance the lawman's father had left was long gone now.

"A mite hot," was how things in the sheriff's department were that afternoon. Sundays were usually quiet too, and this one had been until the present loud interruption had appeared. "If you don't mind, I think I might," _push past you and escape out into the squad room where there's air to breathe_. But he couldn't say that, couldn't go anywhere. J.D. Hogg had the doorway tidily blocked off with his belly and his wide brimmed hat and that smirk that knew precisely how uncomfortable Rosco was. "Turn on my fan."

"By all means." No one could say that J.D. Hogg was anything less than a magnanimous and well-mannered leech on society. "Go right ahead."

So Rosco did and for a glorious moment he could breathe, he could imagine better days spent in better ways: courting Bessie Mae by Hazzard Creek, under the shade of a live oak hanging heavy with Spanish moss.

And then he realized that he was still being spoken to, loudly and ever more insistently over the drone of the fan. Which was old and rattled and no matter how much of a breeze it set up, it couldn't blow him out of here and back to those better days.

He turned the knob back down to a lower setting, and the fan shuddered, creaked and settled at barely moving the air at all.

"What was that?" he asked. And it would take a hundred fans, maybe a thousand, to blow away the trouble that still stood just inside the threshold of his office door.

"I was just saying," J.D. started up again, laying his rotten old cigar on top of the shelf that held all of Rosco's police manuals. Flammable things, and he halfway wanted to get the cigar away from them, but that would mean touching it. Holding it himself, because his office didn't have an ashtray, and J.D.'s hands were busy, taking off his hat and fussing with what little hair he had underneath. Combing his fingers through it as though it had been mussed by the fan, when it hadn't been anything but a greasy mop of frizz for as long as anyone in Hazzard could remember. "That it seems to me you got a problem."

Oh, he had a few and most of them started and ended with the man standing in front of him. But no, that wasn't fair. It wasn't J.D. Hogg's fault that Rosco'd had to let three deputies go last month because the county was too broke to pay them. And it wasn't J.D. Hogg's fault that the youth of Hazzard County didn't seem to know that they'd do better to behave themselves and not make mischief wherever they could. And it wasn't J.D. Hogg's fault that Bessie Mae, with her sweet smile and her soft curves, had stopped coming around to the sheriff's station or to his home. That she'd firmly told him to stop calling on her and leave her be, because she'd found another man. One that paid her more attention and didn't leave her to wonder if he'd show up for a dinner of her scrumptious fried chicken, or whether he'd be out all night chasing the ghosts of bad guys that had run off.

But he didn't explain any of that to the gluttonous man in front of him, who had stopped messing with his hair and his hat and retrieved his cigar like it was his only friend in the world. (And maybe it was.) He just stood where he was, waiting for it, whatever it was going to be. Tried to be tough and impassive, tried to maintain his posture and his calm, but a few seconds of silence and he could feel his shoulders starting to slump. "What problem is that?" he finally gave in and asked.

"Moonshiners."

Rosco almost giggled, thought better of it. Didn't want to be stuck in this airless office all day, sweating and explaining what was so funny.

He had a policy when it came to moonshiners. He didn't bother them if they didn't bother him. For the most part the moonshiners kept to their half of the bargain, and if they ever riled up revenuers or the law of other counties, Rosco would help out where needed. Otherwise, he left them be.

Besides, the man in front of him ran his own line of moonshine, here and there. Serving swill to those infirm or otherwise unknowing enough to drink what might as well have been turpentine for all that it resembled good liquor.

"I'll take it under advisement," he offered instead. It was the sort of thing powerful men had said around these parts for all his life, and it always worked, too.

"Best you do." Except, of course, with a mule as stubborn as J.D. Hogg. "Especially them moonshiners that run through Black Hollow to Wigley's Ridge." That was Jesse Duke's territory and everyone knew it. Including the man in white, standing in front of him and smiling like a cat with a mouse's tail hanging out of its mouth. "By the way, rent's due on your mama's place. It's getting time for a new lease, too. Reckon I may have to reconsider that gem of a deal I've been giving you."

And with that, J.D. Hogg flicked the ashes from his cigar onto Rosco's floor, turned his wide body around in an awkward half circle, and bid his adieus.

Leaving Rosco to turn his fan up onto high and do his best to ignore everything but the air it provided.


	3. Swords in his Gizzard

**Three: Swords in his Gizzard**

 _July 1, 1974_

"Daisy? Daisy Duke, what a surprise. What are you doing here?" Too loud, too excited. But then again, it was just about everything she wanted to hear as she walked through the musty stacks of the Hazzard Free Library.

"Hi, Enos!" she greeted, her excitement breaking out like a spontaneous case of measles on her flushed face.

The echo of a cleared throat made its way through high shelves of old books.

She lowered her voice. "How are you?"

"Oh, I'm just fine," he offered back, with those perfect manners she so admired (and figured her cousins would never learn). "You sure do look cute in that little dress." And then lost her appreciation with nine short words.

Or maybe only three. _Cute; little dress_. As though she were eight and playing dress up in Aunt Lavinia's too-long frocks and clunky shoes. Outdated and loose in all the wrong places. Maybe that was what she looked like to him, and maybe it made sense. She'd worn this same dress through most of high school, and it had been her best, but she wasn't a schoolgirl anymore.

"I came to inquire about a job," she explained, standing up taller. Using words from her schooling, spoken by English teachers who no one ever mistook for being _cute_ or _little_. "Here in the library. After all, I am through with school now." And the family could use her help, she figured. What with the lost income from her cousins' failed moonshine run earlier in the week, and how Jesse said it sounded like competitors, not revenuers, that had been chasing the boys. Which meant that they'd have to figure out a few things, maybe change their running route and switch up nights, maybe use another car and run a decoy and—

All of that would take time. Days or maybe weeks unpaid and she had ambitions, anyway. To do more than run moonshine, to write poetry and music and stories and a library would be a perfect place to work. To watch people come and go and to read when there was no one around.

"That's great, Daisy! You graduated?" All grins and happier for her than she could even manage to be for herself. How could she stay mad at him? Besides, it wasn't his fault that she wasn't anything more than cute. "Congratulations! I hope you get the job."

Yeah, well. The librarian, who was a different one than the lady that ran the place a few months back during term paper season, had been very nice. Quite friendly and almost maternal. Had been encouraging in a general sort of way, but had informed her that there were no county funds for any new library staff. It was just her ( _I. Young_ , the nameplate on her desk said, though she was anything but young) on weekdays and Maybelle Tillingham on Saturdays, and there just wasn't a penny to be spared for another person to work there. She'd tsked about things she couldn't change, then asked if Daisy was related to Jesse Duke. Got that dreamy look that all the widows in Hazzard always had when she learned that he was Daisy's uncle. Told her to give him her best, then sent Daisy on her way.

And it was the urge to look at the stacks of newspapers for any help-wanted ads that had led Daisy to finding Enos at one of the big tables, thick, mildew-smelling books with serious gray covers opened here and there around him.

"What are you doing here?" she finally recovered herself enough to ask. There she was, taking insult at what were at worst fumbled compliments, and she'd totally forgotten to even be halfway friendly back to him.

"Studying." But somehow, this new, grown up Enos Strate could do that to her. Could make her feel one way and act another, could excite her and anger her and confuse her—

Studying? "You ain't in school no more, neither," she asked, all those English classes with their proper grammar fading away from her memory again. "Are you?"

Something close to a full out cough sounded from the front desk.

"No, I'm studying the law." But clearly Enos hadn't heard the cough or hadn't understood what it meant, because he was still speaking at full volume in that quick, excited way he had. Eyebrows up and just as thrilled as could be to tell her all about it.

Daisy started to pull out a chair, figuring that maybe if she sat they'd be a little closer. He could talk quieter and she could get a better look at his eyes. And his shoulders under the brown checks of his shirt, and the muscles where his forearms stuck out of the rolled-up sleeves. But the chair was heavy and scraped loudly on the linoleum flooring. Enos hopped up—

"Allow me," he said in full voice, and a tapping came from the front of the library, like a judge with a gavel.

It was all ridiculous from there on, how Enos stepped heavily onto the big toe that stuck out of her sandals, eliciting her involuntary yelp. How his alarmed, "I'm real sorry, Daisy," carried far enough that it was probably heard in Chickasaw, how the chair tipped and teetered and hit the floor with a cheerful thump. How she tried to reassure Enos, but there was the click-click-click of heels coming at them all the same, and half of her wanted to run like a naughty girl caught with dirty knees in church. How they got startled by the librarian's sudden appearance when she told them to clean up their mess and take their leave, please, in clipped tomes that brooked no sassing.

How the library had been empty all along, except for them and I. Young, so there wasn't anyone that their clatter could have disturbed.

But they left like the scolded children that they had once been and found themselves out on the snug front porch. With the wide, round columns in front of them and the solid oak door at their backs, and their giggles echoing loudly off the high arch above.

And then they sat on the concrete steps that were a poor imitation of marble, worn mostly smooth by the passage of feet, but chipped and pocked in places where spring hailstones had smashed against them. Talked about the things they hadn't had time to say before – Daisy's high school career and ambitions, what Enos had been up to lately.

Seemed he'd spent a year and a half shadowing his mother's cousin, who was a sheriff down somewhere around Savannah. Because despite the fact that he could have inherited his father's still and earned enough making and selling moonshine to own a hot-rod car and take out five different girls a week – which was all the ambition most guys in Hazzard displayed – he wanted to do something more, he said. Wanted to help folks, to rescue them from gators and quicksand and crooks in the night.

Though he said mostly what he'd been able to do in Savannah was to chase after wayward lost pets and escort older ladies across the street.

Somewhere minutes to hours of telling tales and sharing dreams, she figured that the three years difference in their ages fell away. He stopped making her nervous and she stopped being "cute" (she hoped) and they just became another couple (or at least a pair on the way to becoming a couple), halfway courting on the library steps.

* * *

 _July 2, 1974_

It probably wasn't the best night for them to go riling Rosco Coltrane. Then again, it probably wasn't a good night for just about anything, and riling Rosco was just the by-product of the bad night that it already was.

Besides, it was his and Luke's bad night first.

Starting in the afternoon, with Luke and Jesse going at it like they hadn't in years. Still tense after the moonshine run gone bad, and it hadn't sat well when Jesse said it was more likely competing moonshiners trying to weasel in on Duke territory than lawmen that had been chasing them. No revenuer could drive half as good as any Duke ever had, and Luke had jumped in right about there with the complete conviction that the whole mess had been some kind of scheme brewed up by J.D. Hogg.

"He wants the land," Luke had asserted, "and what better way to get it—cheap—than to try to put us out of business?"

But Jesse had insisted that Hogg wasn't that evil. He was a greedy fool, sure, selfish and crafty when he wanted to be, but he was also an old friend. And former business partner and there was an honor code between them that J.D. wouldn't break. Luke said it had been shattered to smithereens years ago and all but called Jesse blind to the truth. It had been one of those epic battles, the likes of which hadn't happened since Luke was a teenager. When Jesse'd had enough of the fighting, he'd agreed to disagree with Luke, then sent his two boys out for the evening.

 _I love you, but I don't want to see you for a few hours._ The old-timer hadn't said it, but it was there in the way he'd told them that they didn't need to hurry home.

Luke had been irritable the whole drive to the Boar's Nest and his mood wasn't improved when the pickup blew a tire just outside of town. When they'd finally made it to the county's best (and best primarily because it was the only) watering hole, with their jeans filthy and their hands smelling of rubber and dust, there hadn't been anywhere to park except around back where a number of junkers had been abandoned years ago.

By the time they made it inside, there'd been no tables available, and Cooter Davenport, who was usually good enough to save a few chairs in his usual corner, had a full table with some guys that the Dukes didn't know. To make matters worse, J.D. Hogg, who owned the place, was taking up an entire booth, a plate of food in front of him that would have fed an entire den of wolves, and a cigar wedged tightly between his fat fingers. Beady eyes rolling around and watching, just watching.

All of which meant that he and Luke already had dibs on grumpy, tense, miserable and mean long before they ran into Rosco in the first place, so the sheriff could just go out and get his own damn mood.

Funny if the mood Rosco chose didn't turn out to be almost the same and Bo and Luke's, though. At least, it ended up that way. No telling how it started.

There was no band that night, no hope for one in sight. The platform along the far wall was empty and dark, just taking up space that could otherwise be used for dancing. The jukebox was playing but ever since it had been lugged in the door two years back by a couple of burly truckers, there had only ever been about three different albums in there: one Willie, one Waylon and one Johnny. Oh well, at least everyone knew the songs by heart and could dance to them.

Bo left Luke at the bar – his cousin was old enough to order a beer and Bo still had a month before he could do the same – and went over to where the girls were. Clumped, as usual, around the edge of the open space, between the pay phone and the door to the private rooms at the back. Hidden spaces that used to be a place to hold parties or maybe play a game of pool, but that was back a bunch of years ago now. When the roadhouse was called Hazzard's Hijinks and was owned by Hiram Murphy. It was more of a restaurant back in those days.

Then J.D. Hogg had snatched the place up in a bankruptcy sale back in 1970 and turned it into a roadside truck stop, and those rooms in back had never been seen again. Not by regular people, anyway. J.D. Hogg had turned them into some sort of an office, but it was also a space for his rendezvous. Which no one really wanted to think too hard about, especially since everyone in town – save Rosco Coltrane – knew that J.D. had taken a shine to the sheriff's sister Lulu. Whatever was going on in that back room could just stay there.

But in front of the door that night was one of the prettiest lineups Bo had ever seen. Of course, he thought that every time he came here. Most of the girls were older than him but that didn't matter when he'd crested six feet a couple of years ago, and then grown some more after that. He looked man enough to get most of them out on the dance floor and the dim lights mostly hid what Luke always called his baby face.

In short order, he was dancing and Luke was drinking over at the bar, smirking at something Dobro Doolin had said. Watching Bo dance, because he always did – whether to make sure no one offered him any real alcohol in a public setting or to make his private judgements about the girls that Bo chose, no one knew – and then it started. Just some indecipherable hollering at first, then the crowd rolling back, toes getting stepped on and _what the hell!_ getting shouted by long-haulers and other uninitiated patrons. The ones who hadn't yet turned their heads toward the noise and set their feet, because they didn't know any better.

Most of the clueless ones were out of the way before the mess came tumbling out of the middle of the floor. Mostly it was a blur of different colored shirts, torn open and flying in the breeze caused by swinging arms and cocked fists. But somewhere in thick of the muddle, Bo caught a quick glimpse of Cooter's face, those focused eyes that his aimless friend only got when he was picking a target for his fist. Hair flying as the momentum of the pushing, shoving knot of fighters forced him toward the bar. Then the image was gone as the ranks closed in. A typical night for Hazzard's finest (only) drinking establishment.

"Cooter!"

The man might have been a drunken fool half the time and a hungover fool the rest. Might have been supposed to have become an adult somewhere close to a decade ago and it might just be that his reluctance to do so was the only reason his aging father hadn't yet retired and left him the Hazzard Garage to manage. He might have been spoiling for a fight – any fight – since before Bo and Luke were even born, but he was their friend. He was in the middle of a brawl, most likely about to get punched harder than he was expecting (Cooter always did manage to get surprised all over again that fighting hurt) and Bo wasn't about to leave him in there to duke it out on his own. He deposited the girl he'd been dancing with – the one in the blue tank top with white shorts underneath (Mary, maybe?) – safely on the sidelines and dove into the ruckus.

"Bo!"

The up and down of the growl meant that Luke was annoyed at his recklessness. Which was silly, because Luke liked a bar fight as much as the next guy, maybe even more. He just had unspoken rules about waiting until someone had the gall (or the idiocy) to hit a Duke first. Himself, Bo, Daisy – didn't matter who or how hard, and Luke would be in there teaching a hard-hitting lesson to the fool. But he wouldn't jump in of his own accord.

Bo figured it was just a matter of time before Luke would have been in the fray anyway, so what was he complaining about?

And then all those thoughts had to stop, because his ear was ringing and his cheek burning as red-hot as a fireplace coal. He turned toward the hit and couldn't quite figure where it had come from. The only guy in front of him was one of the guys that had been sitting with Cooter. Couldn't have been that guy that hit him—

Didn't matter, next thing he knew he was on the floor, smelling beer and tasting blood from his split lip. He saw the guy that hit him that time, big and hairy and not a local man. Watched the guy's face go from triumphant to surprised when Luke grabbed the back of his shirt and pulled him away. Then shock flashed over to pale fear, which was a smart thing to feel when Luke's fist was cocking back.

The stranger's head twisted to the side with the blow – a pulled punch if ever Bo saw one – and he stumbled off a few steps. Then Luke was offering a hand down, getting a solid hold on Bo's wrist and yanking him up. Looking at his face and tsking over whatever he saw there when the next wave of the fight caught up with them.

Bo didn't see Luke again for a while after that. Heard him, once or twice, that unmistakable growl he let out when he took a blow to the gut. Took a few more whacks himself, traded swipes with a different stranger. This guy was almost as tall as him and heavier, but wasn't very coordinated. It was easy enough to duck under or to the side of his attempts, and then it was even easier. Too easy, because the crowd had parted and about all that was left moving was his fight and Luke's, Cooter over by the bar and maybe Dobro was still caught up with some guy. Then his ears were ringing all over again.

Gunshot; took him too long to figure that out. He whirled toward the sound, dizzying when the whole room did the same, and there at the center was Sheriff Coltrane, having his own bad night. Gun pointing at the ceiling and his lips moving, though Bo couldn't pick out what he was saying over the cottony thickness of his half-deaf ears.

"That's them," came to him more clearly, and he turned his head toward the sound though he knew perfectly well whose voice it was, even before the smell of cigar caught up with him. "Those two right there." J.D. Hogg, jabbing his fingers (still stretched around the offending cigar) first at him, then at Luke. "Those Duke boys, they're the ones that started it."

"What?" His voice cracked in protest and Luke came to stand at his side. Whether to get him to hush or to support him, he didn't know and it didn't matter. "We didn't have nothing to do with—"

"And just look at what they done to my beautiful establishment! All them broken chairs—" There could have been a grand total of two, Bo couldn't swear. One of them might just have been knocked on its side. The other was definitely short one leg, but it wasn't anywhere near him and Luke. Besides, the Boar's Nest hadn't been anything other than a disaster, even on its best day.

"We ain't done nothing!" It might not have been his best defense ever. They had clearly done _something_ , just not what Hogg was insisting they'd done.

Luke's arm was hard across his chest then, holding him back like they'd been going a hundred miles an hour and he'd had to slam on the brakes. "What Bo means is, we didn't start the fight and we was only defending ourselves – and our friends," because Duke boys might have been poor and wild, but they were raised to be strictly honest. "And we didn't break nothing."

Funny, the whole bar seemed a lot emptier. There weren't nearly as many strangers in here as there had been, and a lot of the girls were gone, too. Must have taken advantage of the noisy distraction in white suit to make their escape out the front door. Away from the man with the gun and the badge and the handcuffs.

"Sheriff Coltrane," J.D. Hogg went right on with his tirade, ignoring the objections. "Are you going to arrest these two for vandalism and destruction of property, or aren't you?"

"Well," the sheriff said, finally getting around to holstering his gun. Since the ceiling had already bled out and most of his suspects had run off, anyway. "I can't say that I saw them vandalizing or destroying anything." And furthermore, it was late in the evening and Rosco would probably be content to go back to quietly watching the crowd from his corner. Odds were, he really had no interest at all in going over to his office to file a report.

"I saw them do it, and if I saw them do it, it would be in your best interest," was a threat. Bo wasn't sure what J.D. Hogg had on poor Rosco, but he did know that tone. It was the one that got used to lean on folks who'd fallen on hard times, those that were ripe for being swindled out of their ancestors' land. "To arrest them. For fist fighting, vandalism, destruction of property and," Hogg simpered, "creating a nuisance."

Rosco took off his hat and scratched his head. Looked at him and Luke, then back at J.D. Hogg. Looked at the door like it was him that was about to get arrested and he was considering an escape. Looked back at him and Luke, and sighed. "You'll have to sign a complaint," he said.

"Now just wait a minute!" Luke generally considered himself far too mature to set up a fuss. But this time he was right there with Bo, protesting the ridiculous. "We wasn't anywhere near what got broke, we didn't start the fight and—"

"And that's the truth, Rosco," Cooter butted in. Which was kind of him, but it wasn't like his reputation with the sheriff was exactly stellar. Cooter had spent his share of still-drunk-and-well-nigh-onto-hungover, black-and-blue-in-the-face nights behind bars.

"Rosco," J.D. said, darkly. "I strongly recommend that you arrest these menaces to society, immediately."

Which was how he and Luke came to be handcuffed to one another, riding on the lumpy back seat of the county's lone, decrepit police vehicle, sitting carefully to avoid those tricky springs that could poke a man where it hurt. Trying to reason, and it was a fool's errand.

"Aw, come on, Rosco. You don't really want to do this," Luke offered.

"You'd be smart to call me Sheriff Coltrane," was a silly objection, when they'd been calling him Rosco since they were twelve. "And to hush."

"But we ain't done nothing!"

"That's 'we haven't done anything'," Rosco corrected, like he was some kind of schoolmarm in a knit shawl with his hair in a bun, lecturing third graders on proper English. "And you have, you've been thorns in my side since you was tykes." And then Rosco mumbled to himself a bit about whether they were thorns or knives or swords in his gizzard and just settled on how they'd been pains since the day they were born.

Then the brakes' squeal covered whatever other insults he might be throwing at them, and there they were, coming to a stop in front of the county administration building. The one with the jail and sheriff's office at one end, and the courthouse conveniently at the other.

"Get out of there," Rosco was growling at them from just outside the cruiser's open door. "Come on," with real anger when it took a few seconds to coordinate themselves and move in the right direction. Out onto the abandoned sidewalk under the moonlight and it was late. Too late, he figured, because just like he had been a thorn in Rosco's side a few times before, and so had Luke before him. They knew how this went. Booking, fingerprints, their one phone call. Jesse grumbling that it was late at night and since he had chores to do early in the morning – and since he'd be doing them alone, thanks to the reckless ways of his fool nephews – the two of them could just spend the night in jail. He'd be by in the morning, or afternoon, whichever suited him more, to get them out. (And then the real lecturing would begin.)

"Sheriff," Luke said, his hands coming up like he needed to surrender now, when he was already in cuffs, shuffling up the concrete stairs to the administration building, with its jail cells getting ready to welcome a pair of Duke boys.

"Just don't," Rosco said, and the overhead lights from the lobby shined through the dusty glass doors to illuminate his face as he led them in. Hard look, meaner than Bo had ever seen before. Something old in there, too. Tired. Lines at the corners of his eyes and mouth, all pointing down. Bo hadn't thought about it much before, because half the time the sheriff acted like a gleeful kid, but Rosco had to be somewhere near Jesse's age. "And don't you start in either," he added to Bo. "Now get in there and don't give me no trouble. And you'd best keep a wide berth around me from now on, or you might find yourself in here for more than a night."

"Is that a threat?" Luke always was the quick one. Or defiant, whatever – Bo didn't like it. Clearly Rosco was annoyed with them and it didn't do any good to antagonize him further.

"No," the sheriff informed them as he pulled out his ring of keys and let them into the suite occupied by the sheriff's station. Pointed over toward the high desk where he always took their fingerprints. No one knew what Rosco did with those prints after he got them – it wasn't like most offenses in Hazzard were serious, but the fingerprints got taken every time. Even if Rosco must have had a dozen sets each of his and Luke's by now. Maybe he kept himself a scrapbook in one of the storage closets around here. "It's just fair warning. If I catch you boys doing anything at all," he unhooked the cuff from Luke's arm, which meant Bo could finally straighten his shoulders instead of stooping. Funny how his arms had grown longer than Luke's. "I ain't gonna look the other way."

"You ain't never looked the other way," Bo informed him and maybe it was the bad night talking. And the memory of other bad nights spent in a jail cell.

"Boy, you don't know where I've been looking. And what I've been overlooking, but I can't do it no more, do you understand me?"

Yep, they understood. Perfectly. Which made it a worse than bad night.


	4. The Morning After the Night Before

**Four: The Morning After the Night Before**

 _July 3, 1974_

Bears roused from hibernation in mid-winter were easier to deal with than Jesse Duke retrieving his boys from jail the morning after the night before. Announcing that it wasn't their faults and they hadn't done anything wrong (not really) wasn't going to help anything, but Bo always was a fool for hope, so he tried anyway. Luke just kept his quiet and waited for the lecture.

Or the lecture after the lecture, part two or maybe even part three in the lecture series. Because the first one took place in the sheriff's office, in front of Rosco Coltrane and it only contained half the words. The ones about how Jesse wasn't as young as he used to be, how none of them were. The old-timer just didn't have the energy for wrangling naughty boys anymore and they were supposed to have outgrown this sort of thing by now. Jesse had been in his share of fights once (though precisely when that might have happened was anybody's guess; even Rosco looked dubious as that part went by) but he'd learned to keep his temper, to talk things out because fists never did solve anything—

Bo just looked at his hands and said _yes, sir_. They'd been freed from the chill of the cell that had smelled like a cross between mold and wet dog. Where Bo hadn't slept much and Luke had slept less, but that was the point. A night to look at bars and the shadows that the moon threw through that one high window, and think about things. What they should have done and shouldn't, to give the guilt time to marinate in their guts until it was a sour stew of sorrow.

(But it really hadn't been their faults. Not much. Bo had jumped into the fight with both feet, and there wasn't a soul in Hazzard that would have expected him to do differently.)

Jesse left out a lot of things in the preview lecture. Because, sure, he wanted Rosco to see him scolding his boys. To have the awkward experience of watching them get berated so he'd know, maybe, that Jesse was taking everything very seriously. That this wasn't just going to be swept under the rug. (Or it might just have been fun to make Rosco squirm uncomfortably as he witnessed it. If so, some part of Luke could appreciate that.) But Rosco was still the sheriff, and there were things you just didn't go announcing out loud in front of a lawman.

Part two of the lecture would be more private, probably on the way home. In the tight confines of the pickup truck where the smell of dried sweat and old beer in their clothes and hair would be ripe as they just about sat on each other's laps. Jesse's red-hot anger would be conducted from one of them to the next as it was loudly explained that the family couldn't afford for them to be damn fools right now. Not when they hadn't been paid for their work recently, not when their work, such as it was, was still floating through the slow currents of the swamp thanks a pair of bungling boys who hadn't been able to outdrive a few competitors. And Bo would probably dip his head all over again, and be deeply sorrowful on behalf of the both of them.

But the third lecture, that would wait. Twelve hours, maybe fifteen. Even more if it had to, until Bo was asleep and Luke was smart enough to head out to the porch. To take that third lecture in private. The one about how he had to be better than that. Had to be careful, had to be vigilant with Bo. Had to set an example every minute of every day, because he was the oldest and Bo would follow him anywhere. Would do anything he thought Luke would appreciate, because Bo looked up to him. Idolized him and in Bo's eyes he was perfect. So he had to be smarter, had to know better. For both their sakes.

And Luke didn't want lectures two and three, wasn't looking forward to them a bit as he and Bo stumbled out of the administration building into the morning, squinting against the sun like a pair of vampires.

Then again, there were fates worse than Jesse's tongue-lashings (and even worse than whippings, though Bo would swear it wasn't so). Or fate, maybe there was only one, but it was waddling up the steps all the same. Reflecting more of the sun than a pair of jailbirds could stand and reeking of the cologne that was supposed to hide a multitude of sins, but never quite managed the task. Mint juleps, cigars and something a little bit rotten – those smells lingered underneath the artificial sweetness.

"Well, well, well and well. Jesse Duke, imagine seeing you here."

Bo sneered, pulling one side of his face out of shape. "How surprising," was full of sarcasm, which wasn't really Bo's forte. Still he was managing it well enough this morning. "That you'd find our uncle here getting us out of jail when you're the one who put us there."

J.D. let his hand, heavy with a pinky ring that was big enough to double as a billiard ball, come up to rest on his double breasted chest. Like he was having a heart-flutter at the suggestion that he was anything but an honest, respectable citizen out for his morning stroll. Except Luke was pretty sure that the man couldn't feel his own heartbeat through all the layers of white cloth and fat. And that assumed that he had a heart to begin with.

Still, getting snide wasn't helping anything. It was just providing old J.D. with the excuse to get dramatic.

"What did you want, Mr. Hogg?" Luke asked, with chilly politeness. "Since you happened to find us here?"

"Want? Want, want, want?" Hogg echoed. "Why, I don't want a thing, young man," matched Luke's politeness with simpering obsequiousness. "I reckon it's enough for me to know that you boys are all right. That was a heck of a fight you started last night."

"We didn't start nothing," Bo jumped in, leaning forward.

Hogg had the audacity to cower. "No, of course not," he said stepping back. "Not you all. Why you're as gentle as kittens."

Jesse rolled his eyes, whether at Bo or at J.D. was anyone's guess, and stepped between the two of them. Shaking his head like they were a pair of fools. "Good morning, Mr. Hogg," he said, but it wasn't a greeting, it was dismissal. Like they could really just walk past the man and back to their truck without any further interruption.

"Now, Jesse," yeah, it would have required a good bit of luck to get them away from J.D. so easily. That or a whole fried chicken, hidden in one of their pockets and conveniently proffered for the devouring. "Since you are here, maybe we should talk a bit." Luck, a whole fried chicken and an uncle that hadn't been raised on politeness and good manners, and they could have been gone from this place.

"What did you want, J.D.?" was as much a sigh as anything. Even Jesse was probably wishing he could get away with being rude. If he wasn't so afraid of his mother turning over in her grave.

"Well, as I said before, Jesse," Hogg said, bringing his hand up to his mouth and only then seeming to realize that he didn't have a cigar in it. He tried to play it off by rubbing his face, them smoothing his hand down the pristine white of his jacket. "I know it can't be easy on you, trying to make a living out of that hardscrabble farm of yours. And raising them kids of yours, too—"

"He ain't got to raise us no more," might not have been the very best argument Bo had ever made. Not when they were covered in jailhouse dust and Jesse's hundred dollar bail was fresh in Sheriff Rosco Coltrane's hands. "We're fully grown." Besides, Bo's baby face was right out there for everyone to see.

J.D. tsked. Almost managed to look sad about what Bo had said, shook his head. "Raising them kids of yours on your own," he said again. "I always said it was too much to ask of you and you done your best I'm sure."

Luke's hand was up, pinky resting against Bo's chest. Not so much holding him back as just being there. Staying whatever was going to come next, because some flames just shouldn't be fanned. Speechmaking had always been one of J.D. Hogg's favorite activities; all the better if he could build it to a crescendo and throw in some broken-hearted, wobbling vibrato over a trio of orphans raised by a dirt-poor farmer. Except the Duke kids had shared a largely happy childhood, and there'd always been enough money for whatever they needed. Old J.D. Hogg needed to take his pity somewhere else.

And anyway, Jesse's eyes were already rolling. "Get to the point, J.D."

"Point? Point?" Sorrow had turned to protest, to nursing the great wound that Jesse had inflicted upon him by insinuating that he was up to anything at all other than generosity from the goodness of his Hogg heart. "All right, here's my point. You got far too much to worry about, Jesse Duke. If you wasn't so busy growing weeds and rocks, you'd have time to properly discipline them boys of yours so they wouldn't go tearing apart a fine establishment and center of culture like my Boar's Nest."

"Center of culture?" Even Bo's temper couldn't sustain itself after that. "Luke, did you know that the Boar's Nest was a fine establishment and center of culture?"

"Of course it is, Bo. There's some fine drawing in there," Luke said. Bo's eyebrows lifted, inviting him to go on. "On the bathroom wall. And some excellent literature scribbled in that second stall. So it probably counts as a library, too."

"Boys," Jesse interrupted. Serious in that way that was all for show. "Best you apologize to J.D. for what you done." To make an outsider like J.D. Hogg think that they were actually being disciplined. (Oh, but they would be. Just not here or now.)

"Sorry we defended our friend in a fight," Bo offered.

"And that a chair got broken," Luke added. Which wouldn't be enough to satisfy Jesse most days. But here, now, in the presence of a toad that thought he could condescend to the frogs, it'd do.

"See, there, J.D.? They're sorry. Now if you don't mind—"

"I'm just saying," Hogg butted in, quick as his tongue could work (which was frighteningly quick if the way he went through hog jowls at the Boar's Nest was any indication), "that I could help you with your little problem. By taking that land off your hands."

"I reckon we already said everything we have to say on that subject."

"Maybe," J.D. said, little smile at the corner of his mouth like he was relishing whatever came next. "We talked about the farm, but that ain't the only land I'm talking about. I reckon I could take that other little piece off your hands, too. I'd make it worth your while."

"I don't know what you're talking about, Mr. Hogg."

There were rules to being raised a Duke, to living in the farmhouse that had been in the family for generations. And one of those was that you did not lie.

Then again, there were shades of the truth, and what was white wouldn't throw a shadow over the clan. There was only one thing J.D. Hogg could be talking about, but Jesse couldn't know for sure unless the words got articulated clearly.

Luke knew, and the way Bo's eyes darted over to their corner to try to catch his went to prove that he did, too, that J.D. Hogg was after Lavinia's land.

She'd been the last of the Baldridge clan, and the deed had come to her hands somewhere around the time Luke was born. Then ten years after that she was gone, too, and the deed was stuffed away in some box somewhere, but there weren't any Baldridges left, so the land fell to Jesse.

It was unimproved land, in the middle of nowhere important. Sloped from hollow up to highland and once there had been a cabin about three-quarters the way to the top. Lavinia had been raised there, but now it was more ruin than house. Of course, hidden in the trees along a spring that led down to the creek in the hollow, there was a still. But no one other than the Dukes knew about that. (Unless, somehow, J.D. Hogg did.)

Luke tried to hold his face steady, to give away nothing. But he could feel the muscles in his shoulders tense, and then there was the way Bo was looking at him, and both of them had closed ranks around their uncle.

"I ain't got no land," Jesse said with finality, "that's for sale to you or anyone else. Now if you'll excuse us, me and my boys got work to do that didn't get done this morning." Jesse started to shuffle his way down the cement stairs of the courthouse. "Since they was in jail and all."

Oh, and that look on his face – there were lectures to be doled out and time spent chatting with J.D. Hogg on the courthouse steps wasn't going to make those lectures any more pleasant.

* * *

"Sheriff Coltrane."

There were advantages, Rosco figured, to the fact that Commissioner Chadwick had bungled the county budget. Had made such a mess of things that the sheriff's department had spent more than had been budgeted for the entire year before May was even done. By the time Rosco got a chance to see what the real budget was, instead of the provisional numbers he'd been working with, well, there was nothing to do but let his deputies go. He had even taken a pay cut, though he'd only allowed that much to happen in exchange for keeping his pension. Peanut butter and jelly would feed him for now, so long as there was money waiting for him when he retired. (And as long as he could keep paying the rent on Mama and Lulu's place, because he figured half his sanity came from living separate from them.)

The county finances were a disaster and his department had been decimated, but there were advantages and one of those was quiet. Most days he could sit in his office or patrol the roads and unless some fool had driven their car into a pond or let their cows wander off, it was quiet enough that he could just about hear his hair growing.

"I come to sign that complaint," the voice persisted. Oh, and though he hadn't turned toward it just yet, he knew the sound of that voice. Smug, proud, almost sugary like a peach cobbler that could rot the teeth right out of your head. "Against them Dukes for what they done last night."

Quiet, it grew on a man. Those first weeks of June without any deputies bustling around the place had been weird. Disconcerting, and he'd spent a lot of time out on the roads, just to hear the rumble of his engine and feel the bump of tires running over rutted dirt roads, to smell his own exhaust.

Because the silence left too many gaps, too much space to think. About who he'd been and what he'd done and why. The future he'd tried to build.

He'd been a solid lawman for twenty years. Oh, tiddly-tuddly, he'd been more than solid, he'd been a _good_ lawman, chasing down criminals and protecting his people. Spending night after day in the service of his county, and there wasn't a danger he hadn't faced down and conquered. Twenty years of dedication.

Then Bessie Mae had moved from Auburn to Hazzard and opened herself a little sewing shop. Alterations and repairs and sure, he'd kept his uniforms a bit too long. Had let them get worn so thin that she'd had to pull off a few miracles to resuscitate them, but she'd done it. And then he'd gone searching through his drawers for other clothes that needed mending – his flannel shirts, his church trousers. The one nice shirt he had, his leather vest, his socks and somewhere around Christmas he'd considered rooting through his underwear drawer just for something else to bring her, when she'd showed up at the Busy Bee Café. He was in his usual back booth having his usual hotdog slathered in chili and topped with mustard (with onion rings on the side) when she slid in beside him, held a suspicious sprig over his head and kissed him. He'd sputtered and choked on his hotdog, and a few solid thuds on his back and threats of the Heimlich maneuver later, she'd explained it was mistletoe and that she figured if she didn't move first this here relationship would never get off the ground.

She'd known, of course, what she was getting into. Had to, when most everything she'd ever mended of his was in shades of blue. And even if she hadn't known all the details at first, he'd told her. How a lawman's life wasn't really his own.

Maybe he was the one who should have known better, but he'd let himself dream, anyway. About a lifetime with Bessie Mae, who was pretty enough, in her slightly wrinkled and rumpled way. Picket fences and flower beds in the front of his dream life, a couple of kids in the backyard. Girls, he figured, sweet and well-mannered. Not like those rough and wild Duke boys. Then again girls would end up attracting the next generation of Duke boys and that would be bad, too.

But there had been no point in dwelling on what his kids would be like, because spring came and she was gone. After a few too many cold dinners and nights spent dressed in her finest, sitting by her window, waiting for a date that never came, Bessie Mae had said she'd thank him not to call on her anymore. Then she'd started seeing Johnny McClellan, the high school football coach, who got off work at the same time every night and had his summers pretty much to himself.

And before Rosco could even start to let those dreams fade away to the nothing that they'd always been, the county funds had crumbled underneath him, he'd had to let go of his deputies, and the silence had come.

He'd run from it at first, driving endless loops around his county, looking for any excuse to get involved with anything at all. But it had been planting season, which meant everyone was too busy to cause trouble. So eventually he'd settled with the silence. Worked through what he had to in his mind, about how he was never meant to get married anyway. How he was like a Wild West hero lawman, who would attract his share of the ladies, but be too busy saving the day to settle down. And after that he'd grown to like the quiet, to feel it settle around him like peace after a long and pointless war.

Then last night he'd had to listen to those Duke boys go at it all night long. First it was about how they hadn't done anything wrong and that Rosco really shouldn't have arrested them in the first place. Then it was about the smell of mold, and didn't Rosco ever clean this place? (No, he didn't. That was a deputy's job and funny thing if he didn't have any deputies to spare to the task anymore.) Apparently jail food didn't suit them either, and it was cold. Which was silly, it was July. Then they started in on each other, Luke saying it was Bo's fault they were locked up and Bo saying Luke would have done the same thing before he got too old to fight properly and it hadn't been anything but a nonstop racket. Rosco told them he wasn't going to babysit them anymore and went back upstairs to his office to sleep in his chair. Which wasn't anything fine, but it was softer than what was down with the jail cells and more than that, it was quiet. Nice.

Then the sun had risen and old Jesse had come. Things had gotten loud again and he'd thought he was happy to see all those irritating Dukes getting out of his office and heading back to the wrong side of the briar patch, out there in the sticks where they could make us much noise as they wanted and no one would hear them. He'd settled back into his chair and stretched. It was plenty warm now and last night hadn't been very restful. Seemed like as good a time as any to find his lost sleep.

And then that other voice had invaded. "You already wrote up the report, I take it." Jefferson Davis Hogg, somehow scolding and shaming him, as though he had a right to tell Rosco how and when to do his job.

"No, I ain't written it up yet," he answered. Tried to sound tough and sure of himself. Like writing reports was something he could get around to when he darn well pleased and—"I was too busy looking after them Duke boys." Made an excuse all the same, because there were big, brown eyes staring at him. Half squinted down in something like annoyance and dismissal all at once.

"Well," J.D. said, and he must have settled on condescending. "I suggest you do write that report. And further, I suggest you keep a close eye on those moonshining Dukes. They're up to no good and if you ain't willing to arrest them, I reckon I'll have to take care of them myself."

Rosco let out a breath he hadn't realized he was holding and hauled his body to its feet. Headed over to the nearest typewriter to do as he was asked. Figured J.D. Hogg would get bored soon enough and leave him be.

"Exactly how do you plan to take care of them?" he asked because he didn't like the Dukes, most days. They were pains in parts of his body that he'd rather not think about, and then again, they were mostly good people, who helped their neighbors and kept their trouble-making to something of a minimum. And he didn't figure he could overlook J.D. Hogg's threats if he meant them any real harm.

"You ain't got to worry about that," J.D. informed him. "So long as you do your job. And if you do, you won't have to worry about your mama and sister, either."

Which was also a threat, but one that didn't allow for a legal recourse. So Rosco scrolled a piece of paper into the typewriter and started asking the man in front of him all those questions that went into filling out a report. Typing his answers with one finger at a time and he was right—J.D. was fidgeting, then fussing, then mumbling something about a cigar and how had he managed to make it all the way into the sheriff's office without one? Rosco didn't know and just kept pecking at the keys in front of him. Finally, J.D. asked if he could manage the rest of the report on his own, and Rosco looked up at him. Pretended he hadn't realized just how slow he was going, and said he thought maybe he could.

J.D. took his leave, promising to be back sometime in the afternoon to sign the complaint. Rosco waited for the swinging doors to swoosh shut, then got up and left the desk, his report still half typed. Figured he had plenty of time for a nap and maybe even lunch before he had to finish writing what he started and he'd still have it ready for the fat man to sign when he got back.


	5. Hot as Blazes

_**Author's note:** As y'all may have noticed, the site's been a bit strange lately. Not sure it's completely right yet, so if I'm slow in reply to anyone, you'll know why._

* * *

 **Five: Hot as Blazes**

 _July 4, 1974_

It was hot, the kind of hot that wilted most everything on which the sun shone. The kind of hot that she could blame things on – had been blaming things on.

Like the way she could feel her hair curling up around her ears, probably frizzing out in odd clumps everywhere else. Because the day before yesterday, she'd walked into Miss Teddy's Beauty Salon and gotten almost all of it cut off.

It was hot, that was what she told herself. That it would be nice, for a change, to have a cool breeze on her neck when it came time to water the fields or harvest the corn. It had nothing, she swore to herself, to do with wanting to look older. With maybe trying to impress one Enos Strate and show him that she really had grown up.

Because here she was, wandering along the long slope in Hazzard Park on July Fourth. Stepping between checked and striped picnic blankets, looking down into the field below where burlap-sack race was vying with the wheelbarrow race for which was the most ridiculous. Wearing the shortest and tightest sundress she owned, and trying her hardest not to look pathetic or lost. Not to look alone, which she most definitely was, when everyone else in the whole town was here and they were all paired off. Heck, even Bo and Luke were together in their own way. Down there in the thick of the wheelbarrow race, Bo's long arms churning as fast as they could while Luke held onto his knobby knees and tried not to push him too fast. Showing off for all the girls, but they were going to lose to a pair of kids that weren't even old enough to have discovered girls yet.

Her hair must look a fright. About chin length now, when it had been halfway down her back, but it was time, right? She was trying to get a job, and she needed to present herself as something more than a schoolgirl. She knew what people thought of girls like her, who lived far from town. That they were backward, wild, from the wrong side of the briar patch. She never minded the assumptions, and never felt bad about proving them wrong. But first impressions could mean the difference between being sent away and being given a chance – at a job and, even if she'd refused to admit she was thinking it at the time, with Enos. So she'd gone to see Miss Teddy and said she was looking for something sleek for summer. Looked at a few photos and picked one out that looked sophisticated and maybe just a touch sexy and said that was what she wanted. What she ended up with looked more like a boyish crop. But it wasn't Miss Teddy's fault that Daisy had forgotten how much her hair curled and frizzed when it was short.

Yesterday morning, the boys had come home from spending the night in jail and they really should have been quiet. Serious and maybe a little humbled and ashamed of themselves, but they'd been raucous as ever. Racing into the kitchen to see what they could find to eat and Luke's eyes, blue as they were, had just about bugged out of his head when he saw her.

"You sure do look different," he said, without a lick of tact or thoughtfulness.

"Yeah, you look just like Luke!" Bo said and giggled like only he would.

Jesse followed them in and told them to get to their room and get changed, and when they'd caught up on all the chores they'd missed, they could come around looking for food, not before. Big feet on old floorboards, but once once their door closed behind all their noise, Jesse told her not to mind them, that they were fools. Then he repeated what he'd said to her the night before: "You're the spitting image of your mother when she first came here."

But she didn't look like some stunning, southern belle just moved here from Chatsworth to steal a young man's heart, and she didn't look like her heavy-featured older cousin with his bright blue eyes, either. What she looked like was the same as she ever had – a pre-teen with a straight-up-and-down, skinny body, skin that freckled in the sun, and a too-wide mouth. Or she looked like a boy, but most boys these days had more hair than she did.

And now she was walking around the edge of Hazzard's most fantastic party, not part of the games or part of the necking couples or part of anything at all. Looking for Enos Strate and not at all sure she wanted to find him.

Seemed to her they'd had a date already. A little rendezvous at the very least and while she knew she didn't have a right to make exclusive claims on him yet, it would seem like he should have called her by now. Should have asked if she was planning to attend this little event (as if there was a soul in Hazzard that wasn't planning to) and whether she was accompanied. But it had been days. Almost a week, and she would have figured he ought to have done _something_ by now. Still, not a peep all week and he was nowhere to be found now. She kicked a pebble and moved on. Scanning the slope she and her cousins had played on as kids, looking at picnic blankets full of buxom girls courting rough-edged boys, young families and everything she figured she ever wanted, right in front of her and she couldn't have it.

She was a fool.

"Look out, Joey!" she heard just before she felt a heavy thump against her leg. Looked down to see a lump of a little boy at her feet, looking at where he'd just bumped into her, then tilting his head to look up at her face. Screwing up his mouth and getting ready to cry.

"You're such a dummy, Joey," came from closer than the warning had, but it was the same voice. A girl in pigtails and a flowered dress, maybe eight to Joey's four.

And then Joey was crying in earnest as the girl, who might or might not have been his sister, tried to haul him up by the arm.

"I told you to look out," she scolded. "Come on, Joey!"

Which only made Joey grab onto Daisy's ankle, like it was an anchor against his sister's tide.

For heaven's sake. Daisy had come out here looking for companionship, but Joey was a little younger than what she'd had in mind.

"Hi, Joey," she said. "My name's Daisy." Which didn't have much of an impact on Joey, but now the little girl, whose dress was probably a hand-me-down based on how poorly it fit her, was staring at Daisy. Sizing her up.

"Me and Joey have to go now," the girl insisted, but Joey didn't seem exactly inclined to agree with her. He was still sitting firmly on the ground, one hand on Daisy's ankle. "My auntie said not to wander off too far."

"How about I help you and Joey find your auntie?" Daisy offered. It wasn't, after all, like she had anything better to do. Joey seemed amenable and let her hold his hand and walk with him, while the girl, whose name turned out to be Irma, pointed this way and that to lead them back to where she remembered her family being. Before long, Joey let go of her hand to run toward a woman that wasn't a whole lot older than Daisy. Irma took her sweet time, and by the time she and Daisy got there, Joey had already loudly explained that he'd been lost and that the "nice lady" had found him.

Which got Irma scolded soundly and maybe that was why the girl moved so slow. (And maybe that was why Luke had dragged Daisy and Bo around as impatiently as he did when they were kids. If anything went wrong, he was the one to get yelled at for being the oldest and theoretically most responsible.)

"Irma was with him all along," she said. "She was doing a fine job of watching him."

Which made the scolding come to a self-conscious stop, and that probably didn't help anything, if the way the woman was looking at Irma was any indication. It'd all just start up again once the little family was alone.

"Where are my manners," the half-harassed woman said, pushing sweaty strands of light-colored hair back from her face. "My name's Velma." Which was one of those impossibly old names that was appropriate for someone's grandmother, but this woman was young. She couldn't be more than five years older than Daisy was. At least as far as she could tell, when Velma's eyes were obscured by sunglasses. But her body was slender and fit nicely into her jeans, and what Daisy could see of her face was unlined. "And Joey here is mine. Irma is my cousin's kid."

"Well, she did a good job of looking out for him," Daisy asserted, and just look at that, how Irma glowed under the praise. "You new to town?" she asked, because pretty much everyone else at this event had been coming since before Daisy could remember, but she'd never seen these three before.

Joey started pulling on Velma's jeans, asking to be picked up. "Um, yeah," Velma answered, bending and hefting the boy, who wasn't exactly small. But he wrapped his arms around her neck and held on as she shifted him into the crook of her right arm. "I'm not really living here, but my cousins are, at least for a bit. They're the ones that dragged me here, and then left me to look after the food and the kids while they're off down there," she said, pointing to where the races were just finishing up. "Playing games." A slight gust blew her hair into her face again and she used her free hand to hold it back. "Them two with the dark hair, tying their legs together for the three-legged race." They were of similar height to each other, at least. They might stand a chance, unlike Bo and Luke who never could coordinate their two different-sized frames.

"I reckon I understand that," Daisy started, pointing loosely at where Bo had collapsed on the ground somewhere short of the finish line. Luke was standing over him, probably complaining that they'd lost to a couple of kids. Before she could get to properly pointing her cousins out, though, a voice from the side called her name.

"Daisy? Daisy Duke, is that you?"

"Enos!" came out for too excited, before she could remind herself that she was a mature woman now who didn't squeal in glee at seeing a man she was maybe courting (but wasn't really sure). "I want you to meet somebody! Enos, this is Velma, Velma, this is Enos."

It was hard to tell, what with the sunglasses and all, but Daisy didn't think Velma even spared a glance at Enos.

"Your name is Daisy?" she asked and it was hard to imagine that Daisy had forgotten to introduce herself sooner.

"Yes, I'm sorry, Daisy Duke," she said, offering her hand. Which was silly when Velma's arms were full of Joey.

"Nice to have met you," Velma answered, "and I'm sorry to run, but I need to go meet up with my cousins."

It probably wasn't the most polite thought she'd ever had, but Daisy couldn't say she as sorry to see Velma go, carrying Joey and with Irma following at a distance behind.

"It's nice to see you here, Daisy," Enos bubbled at her. Smiling so hard that he had to be pulling muscles. "You sure do look pretty today," he added and left it at that. Nothing about her looking like Luke or a boy or her long-gone mother. No specific mention of her hair at all and she figured that was fine, as long as he thought she was pretty.

"I was starting to think you wouldn't come," she said, playfully slapping his arm. Then mentally chastising herself, because it was such a silly, _girlish_ thing to do. Something she would have done to a high school boy, but Enos wasn't that.

"Me? I wouldn't miss the Fourth of July for anything," he said. "Though I did miss the parade, but that was only because I was studying!" Enos was a man, with goals and plans. "But I'm here in time for the fireworks."

With a few hours to spare. "It won't be dark for a while, now," she reminded him.

"Oh, that's okay. I already studied up for the rest of the day with the books I've got. Can't go to the library today; it's a holiday."

So it was, and now that she'd found Enos (or he'd found her) and he wasn't excusing himself to go find someone more buxom or mature to hang out with, she was at a loss for what to do. Up until now her plans for the day had included wandering around until she located him.

"You thirsty, Daisy?" Enos asked. "I ain't got much money so I can't buy you nothing fancy, but I reckon I could afford a drink of coke or something."

She laughed, shook her head. Felt the way her hair bounced rather than swayed and hated the feel. Then put the thought out of her mind, because Enos was here with her, offering to buy her something to drink. That had to make this a date, didn't it?

"The 4-H club is giving out water," she told him. "That's all I need." Besides, his money would be better spent on one of the carnival rides down on the level ground of the field. Maybe the Ferris wheel, where she could pretend to be scared of heights and throw her arms around him for protection.

But for now it was enough to walk next to him in the low angled sun, pausing to say howdy to neighbors and friends. To take a moment to point over towards the races – an egg race this time, and the way that Bo was sprinting past another guy – might have been one of Velma's cousins – who ran with a funny but quick pigeon-toed gait. To accidentally (mostly, anyway) brush her arm against Enos' as she let it fall back to her side. To imagine what it would be like when he took her hand in his sometime, maybe tonight. Since, as far as she could tell, this was their first _real_ date and all.

* * *

"All right, you Dukes."

Sweat dripped out of the ends of Bo's hair, tracing down his spine. More of it was caught in his eyebrows, just waiting to make its way into his eyes. He swiped across his face with the tee shirt he held in his hands.

It was hot as blazes, and Luke was getting ready to run the obstacle course. Which meant that he was cultivating calm, acting like he didn't have a care in the world. Laying back on the grass with his arms behind his head and staring at the sky while he waited for his name to be called. Meanwhile Dobro Doolin was stretching and pacing and stretching some more. Acting like a long-tailed cat in a room full of rockers, because he would be racing against Luke.

One of the great secrets about his cousin was that Luke was nervous, too. Or excited or – something, he just wasn't as calm as he looked. There were things going on in that deep-thinking brain of his before any kind of competition, concerns that always made him touchy as hell. Used to be, back when he was in school, he couldn't be spoken to for hours before a big football game. He'd as soon snap your head off as answer you politely.

Which meant that it probably served everyone best if Bo was the one that handled Rosco.

"Well, hey, sheriff!" he greeted, smiling like a kid being offered a cookie. "You get to missing us already?"

"No, I don't miss you," was good news, even if Bo figured that maybe his feelings ought to be hurt. Seemed to him they were fine guests at the jail the night before last. They went out of their way to keep Rosco busy, anyway. "And that's why I don't want you loitering around here, causing no trouble."

"Ain't loitering," Luke informed him from where he was lying in the grass, looking every bit like a loiterer. "I'm running a race." Which was convincing.

"Rosco," Bo jumped in, because it would be fun to watch the man's face as he stumbled over figuring out how Luke could be running a race while flat on his back, but there was principle at stake here. "It's the annual July Fourth fair. Everybody's here. How can we be loitering when we're here celebrating with all of Hazzard?"

"Ijit!"

Luke raised an eyebrow at him in admiration. An unspoken contest had broken out between them the other night to see who could annoy Rosco more. Seemed like, almost 48 hours later, Bo had won.

"Put on your shirt," Rosco commanded. "And you," he said to Luke, "get up on your feet. Run your race and see to it that you stay out of my hair. I got my eye on you two, and if you give me any trouble at all, I'm gonna cuff you and stuff you and put you under the jail."

Well. That seemed a bit excessive.

"What's gotten into you?" Bo asked him, because all teasing aside, Rosco wasn't normally that short of temper. Maybe the heat was getting to him; there were surly beads of sweat just waiting to drip off his chin and down onto the blue fabric of his shirt which was, as always, buttoned right up to the top.

"You always threaten your constituents like that?" Luke asked from the ground, not moving a muscle other than his mouth.

"What's gotten into me?" Rosco's voice was muffled as Bo pulled his shirt over his head. It only made good sense to put it back on, anyway, what with all the mosquitoes around. "I'll tell you what's gotten into me." His hand came up, finger pointing at Bo. Good thing it wasn't his gun or he might be shooting holes into painful places. "You just – you," pointing down at Luke now, who regarded him with a calmly tilted head. _Go on_ , the twisted smirk on his lips invited. _Tell me what I am._ "You Dukes have been more than enough trouble to me lately. And I ain't got the time for it. So you just—you stay out of my way, or you'll be regretting it."

And Rosco stalked off muttering things that sounded half like curses and half like baby talk.

"What's with him?" Bo asked.

"You got me," Luke answered, and went back to staring at the sky.

* * *

 _July 5, 1974_

 _It was hot. And dark, pitch black, and they were moving fast. Not carrying moonshine, unless it was back there in the secret storage compartments and he just didn't know about it. But no. They didn't have anything illegal anywhere on them or in the car, but still they were being chased. Lights flashing everywhere all around them and all they could do was run like a rabbit with a bobcat on its tail._

" _Why's he after us?" Luke asked. "What does he want?" No answer, so he looked to his right – his right, which meant he was driving and Bo was riding shotgun, how strange – to see his cousin offer up a shrug and nothing more. Also strange, because Bo hadn't been quiet a single day in his life since he was a squalling baby._

 _It was hot, no air coming through the open windows, no matter how fast he drove. The lights were getting closer and the smell of tires burning on asphalt—_

" _Bo."_

— _it was in his mind to ask his cousin what the plan was, what he should be doing. Which didn't make sense, none of it made sense. A pop and a bang; a game of bumper tag and Luke might not have been Bo, but he wasn't a slouch. There hadn't been a day in his life when Rosco Coltrane could match him behind the wheel, much less get close enough to his bumper to ram it. Another crack that he heard but didn't feel, dogs barking somewhere and it was—_

Waking up. In his bed and turning over because he was so dang hot, trying to get the sheets to stop sticking to him, and the lights from his dream were still there. Flickering like a cop in pursuit and—

"Fire! Bo, Jesse, wake up, fire!"

He didn't know where and he didn't know what, at least not until he was on his feet. Still half asleep and running for the kitchen door when he heard Maudine whinny. Barn.

"Boots!" Jesse was shouting from behind him, because he'd almost gone out the door in his bare feet. He stopped long enough to get one on, still kicking the second one onto his heel and he was halfway across the farmyard toward the roar of flames.

Turned back with a thought of going for the garden hose, but, "Me and Daisy got the hose," Jesse hollered. "Get to the livestock."

Then Bo was at his side with the kitchen fire extinguisher – good idea. The fire wasn't big, he didn't think, couldn't see it all, but what he could see looked manageable if they could get in there and get at it. Lots of hay and dry wood crackling at the mercy of the flames—

He was coughing before he even made it inside, tying to keep low. Through the door, brightness of flame but it hadn't reached this end yet. Opening the first gate and swatting at the goats so they'd run, listening to the snap and pop of flames, choking on the smell. Looking to see – maybe it wasn't so bad. Flames retreating from the spray of the extinguisher, and he moved on to the next corral. Hot wood, hot air, hot latch burning his fingers as he lifted it. Maudine, usually so stubborn, was perfectly willing to run the second her door was opened.

"Aim it there, aim it there!" he heard Daisy's shrill yell over the rest of it – the crackle and pop, the goats' complaints, his own coughing. Telling Jesse where to spray, and that was good. Meant they were both still outside.

"Get the chickens!" he hollered to Bo, breathed, coughed. Pointing over to the corner, his shadow looming in the eerie orange of the fire's glow. Went after the dog pen himself, opening the door and pointing out of the barn. The hounds knew enough to follow his silent command.

Tried to think. What did they need, what could he save? Coughing again, stooping low, wondering if it really mattered when the smoke was crawling along the underside of the loft.

Bo was tossing chickens out of the open coop one after another, but they were just clucking around at his feet, making a nuisance of themselves. They never had much taken direction and they'd always seemed to annoy Bo most of all. Luke took to chasing them toward the open door, choking out, "Rabbits!" Kept right on chasing chickens until cool air washed over where he'd swear his skin had been on fire, until it was dark and he could mostly breathe and they were outside. Getting sprayed by the hose which may have been accidental or on purpose. Maybe he really had been on fire.

Then Bo was there at his side, dropping the rabbit cage on the grass and falling to his knees.

Logical, logical, what did they need, what could they not replace? Livestock: safe, tractor: in the other barn. What else, what else?

The loft.

He pulled off the tee-shirt he'd worn to bed, put it over his mouth. Wet – good, that should help. Looked over at Bo to see soot on his face, white of his eyes peering up at him. Gasping and coughing and trying to breathe.

"Stay here!" he yelled or tried. It was a croak, half caught up in the shirt that was still in front of his face. Put up a hand like Rosco Coltrane at a traffic stop, figured his point got across. Bo could read his mind half the time anyway. Ran back into the barn.

"Luke, ya dang fool," carried over the pop and sizzle of flame. Jesse calling him back, but the old man would be the one most heartbroken if Luke didn't make it to the loft. To the chest that had been up there for years now, full of the kinds of treasures that only meant anything to one small family in one small corner of one lost county in north Georgia. So he ignored the call and went forward, toward the ladder. The fire was bigger now, or he had underestimated it before. Hot, hot, hot and he was coughing again. Smoke rising and the loft was up, but he had to go there. Had to try. Got his foot on the first rung, ready to climb.

 _Crack!_ Something fell, a beam or just a board or maybe the wall between the stalls. Sparks everywhere, even where there hadn't been fire before. Flaming tufts of hay falling around him and he had to get out, had to run.

"Bo!" Daisy's scream from somewhere, and then _crack!_ again and there was heat all around him, singing the hair on his arms, taste of fire in his mouth and all the way down into his throat and his vision washed over black.

 _Crack!_


	6. A Messy Mess of a Mess

**_Author's note:_** _I should probably point out that I always picture the Duke farm as it appeared in those first five episodes in Georgia. Old, whitewashed house, trees, sloping farmyard, several outbuildings. In particular, in_ High Octane _, you can see two barns. Jesse pulls_ Tilly _out of one of them, and up the slope a bit, you can see the other one. I tend to think of them as one barn for the livestock and one barn for storage (and one of the stored items is a moonshine runner). This geography of the Duke farm will show itself in this chapter (and forward)._

* * *

 ** _Six: A Messy Mess of a Mess_**

 _July 5, 1974_

It was a mess, was what it was. One big, awful, horrendous mess of a mess.

Smelled like smoke, but not like in a pleasant woodsmoke kind of a way. Like bunt coffee, maybe, too strong and hanging in the air thick enough to clog a man's lungs and turn his stomach. There was water everywhere: small, artificial lakes and streams, plenty of mud. And in the middle of the mess, there were burnt things; melted twisted remnants of something or other, charred wood. There was a disaster where the Dukes' barn had been, and nothing else.

Amos and his firetruck had gotten called in somewhere around midnight, and Rosco had already been en route. Got the call from Gussie the operator, who relayed it from the general emergency number to his home because she figured he ought to know. He'd had Gussie round up the volunteer fire force, then asked her to call Capital City rescue squad for backup. He'd been able to see the orange glow in the sky from the intersection of State Highway 21 and Old Mill Road, so he knew it was bad. Got there to find a flurry of motion, goats and chickens under his feet as he tried to make his way to Jesse Duke and find out what had happened.

Now that the fire was done and the sun was rising, he still had no idea, not really.

Bo and Luke Duke sat side-by-side on their porch, shoulders brushing together. Heads low, filth on their faces, not talking. But then Luke Duke probably couldn't. He'd breathed in enough smoke that he'd nearly lost consciousness. But the boy was tough, had spent time in the Marines and at war. Seemed he'd talked his feet into moving, one step at a time until he was a safe distance from the fire before he'd fallen to his knees, hacking and gasping. Probably ought to see a doctor.

Bo Duke, if it was possible, managed to look worse than his cousin. Dark shadows under his eyes that might have been soot, but were more likely from lack of sleep. Face taut, tense with worry and pain. He needed a real doctor, too, once the day got properly started. For now, Rosco had lightly wrapped gauze around both of those long hands of his. Burns, mostly redness from his fingers to his wrists, but some blisters on the right palm from where he'd fended off falling, flaming debris that had designs on smacking into his face. After he'd gone and been a moron, chasing after his idiot cousin who'd run into a burning barn.

Jesse Duke stood a few feet off in his farmyard, staring at where his barn had been and just plain wasn't anymore. Chickens milling around at his feet, a tethered goat nuzzling at his hand, which was hanging loosely at his side like he'd forgotten it was even part of him. Looking back over his shoulder at his boys and mumbling, "Fools." Shaking his head but there was no ire in it, none of his usual fire and brimstone. Just exhaustion, and maybe, under that, fondness.

Daisy Duke had brought Rosco some coffee. Because of all of them, she was the only one who seemed to remember that he was even there in the yard at all.

"I ain't sure," the girl was saying in answer to a question he'd asked: _what happened here?_ "First thing I knew, the boys were running through the house. You know my cousins ain't exactly light of foot." She looked over at the porch and arched an eyebrow at them. Like it was a joke, but neither of them laughed. Or did much more than sit exactly where they were, unmoving. "Anyway, they was running and hollering something, so I woke up and I could see the fire."

"You didn't hear nothing before that?" He took another sip of the coffee. Good stuff, especially considering that it had to have been brewed with at least one part sleeplessness and two parts worry.

Rosco wasn't investigating the fire, not really. There was nothing much at all left to investigate, anyway.

"No," she answered. So this fire he wasn't investigating hadn't been caused by an explosion, then. That was good to know.

"You have anything in there that could start a fire? Cigarettes, matches, anything like that?"

There was a snort from over on the porch. He turned his head in time to see Luke Duke flick an ash off his own bare arm, which was more than either of the boys had done in what felt like hours. "We're too old to go off sneaking a smoke in the barn, Rosco," Luke croaked at him. Coughed, sounded like it hurt. Served the boy right for offering up that kind of sass.

"We keep lanterns in there," Jesse said. Didn't turn to look at him, just spoke out toward where the barn used to be and the horizon beyond that. "But not kerosene. All the combustibles get kept in the shed, and the cars and tractor get kept in the other barn." Which would be the one a little further from the house, down the slope of the farmyard. It was still intact, probably thanks to Jesse keeping it wet with a garden hose. When he wasn't using the hose to wet and cool Bo's injured hands, that was. "Separate from the livestock. So we won't go setting their shelter on fire by mistake."

"But you had hay in there," Rosco guessed.

"Yep," Jesse agreed. "It burns quick, but it don't start no fires all by itself." Which was the kind of statement Rosco would take note of, were he investigating this fire. Which he most definitely was not. Just following protocol, just showing a little concern for his citizens, that was all.

He cleared his throat. "Any losses to report?"

"Well, our barn for starts," Bo Duke snapped from behind him. He turned in time to see Luke shuffle just that much closer to his cousin, knocking their shoulders together. An odd mixture of consolation and scolding in the gesture.

"Aside from the barn," he clarified.

"Just some tools, Rosco," Jesse answered, and it sounded tired. Like a man who hadn't slept in days, like a man who had lost more than he was willing to say. Like it would take too much effort to explain to a fool like Rosco was it was like to stare at the blackened, stinking ruins of your barn, still sending up tufts of smoke here and there. "Rakes, shovels, a hoe. A couple of saddles, blankets. Milk buckets and," pause there as Jesse turned to look at him. Red eyes, but then he'd been exposed to heavy smoke through much of the night. "Fire buckets," he finished, his delivery dry as toast. No telling whether he recognized the absurdity, so Rosco let it go.

"Sadie run off," Daisy added.

"The other goat," Jesse explained, because Rosco was staring at her, trying to figure out who Sadie was. Far as he knew, there were only four Dukes living here. "Someone'll find her and bring her back." Four Dukes left after Jesse's wife died, back in 1963. Which was only six months after Daisy Duke's father had died and she'd moved here to live with her aunt, uncle and her two already-orphaned cousins.

This family was a mess. Always had been. But they were fairly decent folk when they weren't being pains in his neck.

"Reckon it would be a good thing if you got those boys off to Doc Petticord," he advised the head of the family. "Maybe let him take a look at you, too." Daisy appeared unscathed, but then again, she hadn't gone running into a burning barn to save the livestock and whatever else Bo and Luke thought they were doing in there. Jesse hadn't either, but he wasn't a young man. Last night couldn't have been good for him. "You want me to take you there?"

"Huh?" Jesse asked distractedly, turning to look at him again. "Uh, no, thank you, Rosco. Don't suppose Doc wants to get woke up at this hour. Besides, all our cars are safe and I can take the boys later. Thank you for your concern, though."

Which meant that he'd done all he could do. So he took his leave of the family and headed back to town. Because he was most definitely not investigating this here fire.

* * *

"Don't reckon I need no doctor," Bo said, once the dust from Rosco's cruiser had settled. Which got him a snort and a cough from Luke, followed by rolled eyes. "I like you quiet," he added, bumping his shoulder against Luke's.

Too much smoke inhalation and Luke could hardly talk, much less pick on him. Forced his cousin to skip the whole diatribe about how Bo never wanted to go to a doctor, but that didn't mean he shouldn't. How he'd better get proper treatment, because Luke wasn't willing to put up with him complaining about his pain for the next two weeks. Or whatever other clever comebacks that oversized brain of his had thought up.

"You're both going to see Doc Petticord," Jesse said, when Luke's eyebrows raised like he was about ready to retort after all. "And no arguing." A hard stare at both of them, then he went back to looking at the blackened disaster where their barn used to be. "Later. I reckon the best thing we can do for now is have breakfast."

Which seemed strange – a lifetime of no-food-before-chores, and here he was, getting herded inside for breakfast when about all he'd done the whole morning was sit on the porch and try not to move any of his fingers, not even a little bit.

Standing up was wobbly when he couldn't use his hands to press against the floorboards, but Luke's steadying hand caught hold of his elbow and guided him to his feet and through the kitchen door.

The three cousins got sent to their rooms to "get decent" first, since they were still technically in pajamas. The effort proved interesting when he couldn't use his hands for much of anything. Luke ended up sitting on the edge of his bed, bent low and holding out a pair of Bo's jeans, with one leg rolled up for him to step into. Other leg, and Luke was pulling up his pants for him like he was no more than three.

"Luke," he snapped and shouldn't have. The whole damn thing was utterly ridiculous (and there Luke was, zipping his fly for him), but his cousin was being about as patient as he could be and it wasn't his fault to begin with. Wasn't anyone's fault—

Unless it was.

Luke looked up at him, one sardonic eyebrow raised. _You had something you wanted to say to me?_ it asked.

Bo huffed. "I don't figure that fire started itself."

That eyebrow stayed right where it was, even as Luke straightened up to full height. Fixed him with a look that somehow both agreed with and mocked him. Waiting for him to say something more, but he didn't have anything to add, so Luke went over to their dresser. Pulled out one of Bo's tee-shirts, the soft, brown one, and held it in his hands. Looked at Bo, then back at the shirt, back and forth, like he was trying to figure out how to get him into it. Used to be, when Bo was little and needed help dressing in the morning, that Aunt Lavinia would chirp, "Hands up!" at him, then slip the shirt down over his arms and onto his body. Of course, he couldn't have been more than three feet tall back then. Now he was taller than Luke, even with his hands down at his sides. Raising them up would put them eight-plus-feet into the air. (And damn it all, they hurt. Lifting them up over his head – no way. He wasn't going to do it.)

Luke seemed to concur with his unspoken thought, tossing the tee shirt onto the bed and heading for the closet. Pulling out a button-down shirt and coming back toward him with it.

"Who started the fire then, damn it?" Bo all but shouted. Annoyed at how Luke was looking at his hands and wrists, then methodically unbuttoning the cuffs of the shirt. Solving the problem of how to get Bo dressed when he really ought to be thinking about more important things.

"One guess," Luke answered him, followed by a cough that sounded like the worst cold he'd ever had. Bo was sorry he'd made him talk; that had to hurt.

Then a rolled up sleeve was getting offered to him. Waved in the air a bit when he didn't immediately offer up his arm for the slaughter. There was no way his hand was going through that small hole without cupping it more than Bo wanted to. (There was no way he was getting even one bite to eat if he showed up at the breakfast table without a shirt, injured or not.)

"J.D. Hogg," he agreed, because that was who Luke was thinking of. "He wants the land."

Luke nodded at him, then shook the shirt in the air again. Bo sucked in a breath (and his lungs hurt, too, but nowhere near as much as Luke's had to), and brought his fingers closer to his thumb. Left hand, wasn't as bad as he'd feared. Managed to get it through the sleeve and let Luke pull it up for him.

"But he didn't know what was up there," Bo countered. Luke brought the shirt around his back so he could get his right hand in. Bo had to reach back toward the sleeve, whimpered. His hand, his wrist – the sleeve was too far back and he had to squeeze his hand too much. He was steeling himself to try again when Luke walked back around him. Shaking his head at one or the other or both of them for how he'd tried to do this. Pulled the sleeve off Bo's left arm with a strangely gentle violence. He was frustrated; Bo was hurt. Balancing the two took more self-control than it seemed Luke had this morning. (But it had been a long night.) "Did he?"

Luke worked on rolling up the right sleeve so Bo could get his more-injured hand through first. "Dunno," he rasped.

Bo set to thinking more about the barn and loft than how he was being dressed like a baby by his rough-edged cousin. All that they'd lost, and it wasn't just wood and straw and tools. It wasn't the kind of thing Jesse would have mentioned to Rosco, it wasn't something you could put numerical value on (mostly). But it had to be what Luke went back in for after the livestock was safely out, and though Bo wanted to smack his cousin for his foolishness, he could appreciate that Luke tried.

"Ow," he mumbled when Luke came around behind him again, pulling a little too roughly on the fabric. It didn't really hurt, but he didn't much want to be manhandled, either. Luke sighed, coughed, relented. Slowed down and stopped tugging him around.

Up in the loft, which wasn't anything but ashes now, was most of what had been Lavinia's, once. Some shawls, the scarf she'd almost finished knitting when she died. A couple of girlhood toys, some photos, a mirror that had been handed down in her family for a few generations. A couple of locks of hair that she'd kept after his and Luke's first haircuts, her favorite books. Some old paperwork, old wills and news clippings—

Ow! Cupping his left hand and reaching back.

—all of it stored in her cedar chest and hauled up to the loft within a month after she'd died. Stuff that was important enough to keep, but painful to look at every day, and it had been carefully put away never brought back into the house again. It had stopped hurting to look Lavinia's stuff somewhere back a ways, and they'd each spent time up there sorting through her things and remembering her. But they'd been too lazy to ever haul it back down to the house, and now it was gone.

Luke was in front of him now, buttoning his shirt for him. Tongue hanging out of his mouth because it always did when he was concentrating.

Most of what was lost in the cedar chest was junk to anyone outside the four of them. But a couple of those papers, well. They were useful documents, and he didn't know whether they could be reissued or not.

Luke finished the bottom button, stepped back to admire his handiwork. Smirked, and made a move toward Bo's neck like he was going to fasten that collar button. No, thank you, he wasn't planning on wearing a tie. He swatted Luke back with his right forearm.

"Ow," he whimpered.

Luke managed to look like he felt bad about making him do it. For all of a second, anyway.

Then he put on his own pants, pulled his shirt around his shoulders and left it unbuttoned and untucked. "Come on," he croaked, opening the door to their bedroom.

He was halfway down the hall on Luke's heels before he got around to asking. "Where are we going?" Though there was only one room down here that either of them ever went into.

Luke looked at him over his shoulder like maybe he wondered if it was Bo's brain instead of his hands that had gotten singed. They were headed for the bathroom, of course.

"You going to go to the bathroom for me, too?" Bo asked. Blamed it on the relentless pain, and how it was making him halfway angry to hurt like that.

"You need me to?" He really needed to stop making his cousin talk. If Luke's throat hurt half as bad as it sounded, it was a wonder he bothered to keep breathing.

"I can handle it," Bo assured him, even if he wasn't entirely sure how. He'd figure it out.

But for now, he was getting shoved into the room first. Then Luke was at the sink, soaking a washcloth, wringing it. Turning toward Bo and raising it up toward his face and Bo ducked away on instinct. Luke sighed, coughed, pointed to the mirror. Bo took a look at himself and saw the mess of soot surrounded by filthy blond curls. "You handle that?" Luke asked him.

No, he couldn't wash his own face. So he stood still and let Luke do it for him. Felt the water dripping off his chin and the roughness of the washcloth and wished he could do it himself. Figured Luke was going to scrub all the skin off his face, then it stopped. Soft towel patting him dry, and then his cousin pinched his cheek.

"Now get out of here," Bo said. "So I can handle what I've got to handle."

Luke smirked at him again, hung the washcloth over the towel rack and turned to leave the room.

"Holler if you need help," he grumbled as he stepped out and closed the door.

Leaving Bo to stare at the button and zipper on his pants and wonder which would hurt worse: his hands if he tried to undo them himself, or his pride if he had to call Luke back in here.

* * *

 _July 6, 1974_

She'd been kicked out of her own house. Sent off the property entirely because it had been more than a day. One out of the three days that Luke was supposed to be resting, out of the seven to ten that Bo was not supposed to use his right hand at all, and his left only sparingly. Her cousins had been grounded, and she'd been sent away.

For her own good, Jesse suggested. She should get out and do something, because Doc Petticord had seen to her cousins' injuries and pronounced that they'd both live. So long, that was, as they followed his advice. Which meant keeping Bo's hands clean and bandaged and keeping him from using them. And keeping Luke still.

Good luck. She'd tried doing things for them, bringing them magazines and books and her transistor radio to listen to. Making soups and other soft foods for Luke, sandwiches that Bo could manage to eat with his left hand only. Done their chores and saw to getting the livestock settled into temporary homes. She'd washed their sheets and made their beds, fluffed their pillows and asked if there was anything she could get them.

Got barked at by Luke for her efforts, which set him to coughing and rasping, then stomping his foot in frustration. Got told by Bo to just leave him alone, he was fine (but he wasn't, he was exhausted from all the sleep his pained hands were keeping him from getting) and finally Jesse sent her away.

Go out and enjoy yourself, he said, handing off the keys to his pickup.

She'd kidded herself about how she might like to go window shopping in town, maybe stop in to the general store and pick up some potatoes to mash for Luke. Maybe sit through a movie in the air-conditioned theater, or just walk around the square for a bit. Maybe call on her friend, Sally-Jo, who lived with her parents in a little house just off Elm Street, but in the end, she made a beeline for the library.

Up the steps with her clogs clacking on the cement, the hem of her sundress swishing around her thighs. Into the cooled air, past the desk where I. Young was looking at a book or some files or something and it didn't matter what she was doing when Daisy couldn't spare a moment to take a good look at her.

Clattering her way toward the back where the big tables were and for a split second she considered picking up a newspaper off the periodicals shelf. Pretending she was here to read the want ads, but by the time the thought became a clear one, it was too late and she was standing in front of that one table. The same one she'd found him at that first night, the same one he probably sat at every time he came here to study the law.

Enos Strate was nothing if not a creature of habit.

He looked up at her, smile starting to stretch out his face. Mouth opening to say—

And she didn't want to hear it.

"Enos Strate," she hissed, some attempt to keep I. Young from marching back here and throwing her out before she'd spoken her piece. "Why ain't you asked me out on a date yet?"

Seemed like a perfectly legitimate question when it was bouncing around in her head. Sounded utterly foolish coming out of her mouth. Like an invitation to be rebuffed, like an unmannered girl instead of a self-possessed woman.

"Oh, Enos, I'm—" sorry, and she was. For more reasons than she could say.

"Now, Daisy," he interrupted, quietly. Serious. "Don't you go saying you're sorry you asked me that. I reckon you got a right. I reckon I didn't mind hearing it none, neither."

Her face was hot, her guts were full of electric eels. Her body finally catching up with what she was doing, what she'd said and to whom. "Oh," was about all she could manage to say. She wanted to sit her weak legs down, didn't think it was a good idea.

"Now, I was planning on calling on you, but I figured to wait a couple of days. I heard about your barn and Bo and Luke. And I thought I'd come by and check on you all once them two was feeling a mite better. I figured I could help you rebuild, when you're ready."

"That's nice of you," she said, folding her hands in front of her, primly. Dipping her head a bit because she'd been so busy thinking about what he hadn't done that she'd never taken into account that he probably had reasons, and good ones.

"And then I was going to see if you wanted to come to town and walk around the square a bit, after the barn was done."

"Oh," squirming electric eels, and her heart had jumped into her throat and lodged itself there, merrily beating away. (Or maybe that was I. Young, rapping on her counter again.)

"I just reckoned this wasn't a good time to be asking you to take time away from your family, is all."

"It's good enough," she informed him. "Considering they don't really want my help just now." She smiled, or tried. The way her lips pulled across her teeth felt awkward and staged. "Today, right now, would be good." Those electric eels were dancing a merry little jig, bouncing her heart around like a beach ball on the waves.

"Now?" Funny how his voice seemed to go up at that, how he seemed almost as nervous as she was. Maybe she could hear his heart knocking around, too. (Maybe I. Young was marching over here to tell them to hush, right this second.) "I ain't properly dressed to be escorting you around town."

It was the first time, maybe, that she looked at him that day. Really looked, not just in nervous, fleeting glances, but taking in all the details. The brown and yellow plaid shirt that brought out all the warmth in his eyes, the worn blue jeans, the loafers on his feet. The cute chapped spot on his lip where he nibbled when he was thinking or worrying, the careful way his hair was always combed, even when he didn't take care with the way he dressed. Perfectly clean shaven, with no fuzz left over to hide the flushed color of his cheeks.

"You look fine to me, Enos."

Might have been the wrong thing to say. His color went close to purple, his lips pulled up hard at the corners, taking his cheeks and heck, even his eyebrows with them. His hands twitched, he knocked his knee on the underside of the table. A book fell to the floor with an echoing thud. Enos laughed and Daisy downright cackled.

And that was how they found themselves kicked out on the concrete steps of the library once again, giggling like a pair of fools. Deciding that between them, they had enough pocket change to head over to Monroe Street and stop at Coneiferous, the soft ice cream stand that was open for summer months only. A small cone each, maybe dipped in sprinkles.

Walking on the sidewalk so hot she wondered if their shoes could melt on their feet, talking about their respective job searches. She decided right then and there to put hers on hold for a while, at least until Bo had the proper use of both of his hands.

Enos' efforts weren't going a whole lot better. He was starting to consider whether he'd have better luck becoming a lawman in Hatchapee County, or maybe Placid. Sheriff Coltrane just kept saying he didn't have need or funds for rookie deputies here in Hazzard.

The smell of waffle cones and hot fudge pulled them around the corner from Church Street onto Monroe. They considered themselves lucky to find only a few folks standing in line in their brightly colored summer clothing, waiting to be served. Daisy and Enos barely had time to chat over the flavors (which were really just variations on vanilla and chocolate, but with fancy names) and sizes before an ice-cream-sticky hand reached out the opening in the window to hand off a cone to the young girl in front of them, and it was their turn to stand in front of the screen.

"How can I help you," was friendly, if a bit rushed. Enos was still ticking over potential selections, so Daisy squinted into the small building, letting her eyes adjust from the unbroken sun on the sidewalk, to the relative dimness inside. "I'll have—well, I'll be. Hi, Velma! How's Joey? And Irma?" The owner of the hands that served the ice cream was the same young woman she'd met on Hazzard Park's hillside just two days ago.

At least Daisy could have sworn she was. The blank look coming back out at her from the small shed seemed not to know her at all.

"It's me. Daisy," she clarified, feeling half a fool. "And Enos is with me, too."

The woman regarded her, but didn't smile. Nodded with what might have been acknowledgement of her words, and said, "Can I take your order?"

"Um, yeah," she answered. Feeling silly, but that was definitely Velma in there. Then again, the woman was working; maybe her boss didn't like her to chat too much with the customers? Or, well. Their first meeting had been a bit awkward, what with Joey running off and everything. Maybe Velma didn't appreciate Daisy reminding her of that. "I'll have a small chocolate cone dipped in chocolate sprinkles." Which somehow didn't sound as delicious as it had a few seconds ago, not in the face of Velma's curt nod.

Enos put in his order, and fished into his pockets. Daisy dug through her purse, and together they pulled together enough money to pay, with Enos joking about them going "Dutch treat." By that time, Velma had drawn the soft serve ice cream into cones and rolled them in sprinkles, and was handing them over. Enos paid her and Daisy thanked her. "Hope to see you again soon," she said to be polite, but she wasn't sure she meant it.

Not that it mattered. It was a nice day. A little hotter than she liked, and humid, but she had Enos by her side. Licking clumsily at his cone as sweet drips ran over his fingers. He steered her away from the few plastic picnic tables that surrounded the stand, and they walked out Monroe Street toward the covered bridge over Sandy Creek.

"If I worked at Coneiferous," Daisy said, "I reckon I'd be friendly to everyone."

"You'd be very good at serving ice cream," Enos agreed. "Or anything, really." Then he went back to lapping at his treat.

"Enos," she started, with intent to show him how to lick around the edges of his cone to keep the melting ice cream from making such a mess. Instead, she found herself blurting, "You should go to Sheriff Coltrane and demand that he give you a job."

Maybe it had been working its way through her mind all along. Ever since he'd said something about going to Hatchapee or Placid. He would move to either of those places if he had to, but he must want to be here, close to his parents and all of his friends. More importantly, she wanted him here. Needed him here, at least for now. At least until they got to know each other better and she could decide whether she might be willing to follow him to one of those other counties. Away from _her_ family, and she liked him. But she figured she'd have to love him. Love him an awful lot and then some more on top of that if there was any chance of her leaving Bo and Luke and Jesse for him. And she needed more time to get to love him that much.

Or like him, even, because she wasn't sure about that right now, with how he was laughing. Nervous sound to it, but still. He was laughing at her.

"Daisy, it don't work like that."

"How do you know? Have you tried it?"

He shook his head and more brown rivulets trickled over his fingers. "No, but you can't just go telling people what you want and expecting them to give it to you." His words were sweetened with a chocolate-colored smile.

"Why, Enos Strate, yes you can," she scolded. Wished she'd thought to grab a napkin or two back at the ice cream stand. Maybe they should head back there. Then again, they were almost to the creek. Enos was a country boy, born and bred. He'd washed up in creeks before. "I told you I wanted a date right now, didn't I?"

"You did," he agreed.

"And ain't we on a date right now?" she asked.

"Reckon we are."

"Well, then, you just lick around the edge of that ice cream cone so it won't drip on your fingers no more. And then tomorrow, you go and tell the sheriff you want him to hire you as a deputy, right away!"

He shook his head, but his smile just got bigger and broader. "Tomorrow's Sunday."

"The next day, then," she said, waving her free hand through the air in dismissal of his silly objections.

"Yes, ma'am," he said and there was no telling whether he was agreeing to eat his ice cream properly or to get himself the job of his dreams by the end of the next business day.


	7. Trouble in the Wind

**Seven: Trouble in the Wind**

 _July 8, 1974_

"Just sit," Luke said, and he'd swear it was the tenth time. Maybe twelfth. "You get that gauze dirty, and I'm going to send you inside to get Daisy to change it for you."

The threat was worth its weight in moonshine. If Bo didn't much care for the way Luke had to help him with the simplest of tasks, he was like a two-year-old in full temper when Daisy did anything for him. All but stomping his foot and screaming.

Bo flopped back onto the milking stump with a huff, blond halo glowing in the morning sun. Sadie, who'd made her way back home via a stopover at the widow Hawkins' place (after decimating a flower garden and wreaking havoc upon the shrubs), took the few steps that her short lead would allow, and stood close to Bo. As though she were keeping him company, and it was cute, but it would only be a minute before she decided that eating his hair was more interesting than watching Luke work.

Sticky; it was going to rain. Today, maybe it'd hold out until tomorrow. Burnt wood, broken glass, the occasional melted remnant of something once useful – he'd like to have the disaster of what had been a barn cleaned up before the deluge came and turned the soot at his feet into sludge again. Before the water made it smell as sour as it had that first day.

"Ain't no fair that you got your voice back to normal and I can't use my dang hands for nothing," was a relatively normal complaint. Bo always looked for fairness where none existed, and he never had been patient a day in his life. Plus, he was still hurting, and that made him hard to deal with.

Then again, Bo was carping about not being allowed to do work. Luke figured that had to be a first, when his young cousin had always been content to sit to the side and watch everyone else sweat and toil.

But he was the same brat he ever had been. Tell him he couldn't do something and he'd complain and pout and try to think up every way he could to do that very thing. (Made Luke wonder why Jesse and Lavinia hadn't just forbidden him to do his homework or eat his lima beans. If they'd ever figured that out, the house might have been peaceful for five minutes here and there during the early 1960s.)

"You're supervising," Luke reminded him. That had been the condition of Bo coming out here in the first place. After chores and breakfast, when Jesse'd declared Luke recovered enough to start clearing the space where the barn had been, so they could get around to building a new one. Maudine was barely tolerating sharing space with Black Tilly and the work trucks, and the goats had already started nibbling on the tarp the Dukes used to cover their moonshine runner. The chickens were making a mess of the shed, and the rabbits were living it up in their cage in the corner of the kitchen. The hounds were only too happy to sleep on the enclosed back porch and set to baying at every coon or squirrel that moved in the middle of the night. So the Dukes had to get to work and Luke was of half a mind to send Bo back to bed, so he wouldn't hurt himself trying to help. (And conveniently, it would keep him from whining anywhere that Luke could hear him.) But Jesse had said that Bo could do his part by supervising. From the stump and no closer.

And about a half hour ago, Jesse had gone inside to help Daisy make lunch. At least, that was the official reason, but the girl hadn't needed help preparing a meal since she was thirteen. Luke figured that Jesse's departure had more to do with the fan that spun in the kitchen than it did with anything like cooking. Besides, their uncle wasn't as young as he used to be.

Which left Bo to keep trying to involve himself in the cleanup, especially any time Luke lifted anything that might have gone easier with two people. Which was plenty often, but he could manage on his own.

"Luke," got crabbed at him when he pulled the remains of what had probably been a support beam out of the wreckage. It was heavy and unwieldy but—

And then he dropped it. Let it thud to the ground, because there was the unmistakable whine of a four cylinder car running on three cylinders, and the rumble of tires over gravel and dirt. Bo heard it too, turned toward the noise.

"That car don't sound too good," Bo observed, but then he always was the brilliant one. "Who do you reckon it is?"

"Trouble," Luke answered, because he couldn't see a thing through the mess of dust that was barreling toward them. But most of what came out this way was trouble of one sort or another.

"It's trouble, all right," Jesse hollered from the porch. Either lunch was just about ready and he'd been on his way to tell them that, or his bones must've twinged. He always did say that his big toe could sense danger. "It's Sheriff Coltrane."

And when the dust cleared and the poor car shuddered to a stop under the oak tree in what was almost jokingly referred to as the Dukes' front yard, it was clear enough that Jesse was right. One black backfire that smelled of cheap-grade gasoline, and the door opened. A pair of half-shined boots settled into the dust and Rosco was getting to his feet. Fussing with his hat, then resting his hands on the service revolvers he carried on each hip. Like this was some kind of showdown and he needed to be ready to draw. Bo stood up and Rosco twitched. Same as the rest of Hazzard, he hadn't gotten used to the way the baby of the family towered over everyone now.

"Hey, Rosco," Luke greeted, stumbling over blackened debris as he made his way out of the pile of rubble that had once been a barn. The cruiser door shut with a hollow clunk and one of the hounds barked. "You figure out who burned our barn yet?"

Jesse's hand came up to hush him. Rosco's head tilted with interest.

"What makes you think someone burned it?" he asked. "And that it wasn't just a regular barn fire?"

Because there was no such thing as a regular barn fire. There was the kind that was caused by neglect or foolishness, and there was the kind that got deliberately set.

"Because there wasn't no lightning that night," Bo answered. Luke came forward to stand at his shoulder.

"What can we do for you, Rosco?" Jesse butted in. He offered his boys a stern look, either because they were sassing Rosco or because they were talking to the law at all. Rosco was a friend, most days, but he still wore a badge and men with badges were to be kept at arm's length. Especially when they'd been acting a mite strange lately.

"Tell me, Jesse," Rosco started, and it was funny how his fingers fidgeted just over the butts of those guns. "What all did you do in that barn? I mean, did you ever have cause to have an open flame in there?"

Now, that was an odd question.

"I already told you," Jesse reminded him. "We had lanterns, but kept the kerosene separate. And we used those lanterns seldom. But we was always careful to extinguish them proper when we was done."

"Besides," Luke jumped in, because Rosco didn't know the first thing about farming. He wasn't exactly dumb, but the gaps in his knowledge were big enough to fit a convoy of Mack trucks through. "This time of year, we wouldn't need them. The light don't really fade until around nine, and it brightens up plenty before six."

"I ain't talking about lanterns," Rosco assured them.

Jesse came down one step on the porch. His arms would be folded across his chest if he didn't have quite so much chest to try to fold them across. Instead his hands went into the big pocket at the front of his overalls. "What exactly are you talking about, Rosco?" Careful tone that might pass for curiosity, at least to an outsider.

"Well, now, I may be just a country sheriff, and I ain't never had no other trade," Rosco said and his face twisted a bit. The funny way he pulled his lips together into a bit of a pucker proved that he was being clever. Trying to trap them in a lie, and why? They hadn't done anything wrong (but they hadn't done anything wrong the night J.D. Hogg had them arrested, either) and they were the victims here. "But I understand that there's time you might have an open flame in your barn. Like if you were cooking something."

"We cook in our kitchen, Rosco," Jesse informed him. "The barn ain't sanitary, what with the livestock in there and all. Besides, we got ourselves a stove in the house and all the newfangled gadgets you could want, so we don't need no open flames." Hand coming out of the pocket to wave in dismissal.

"Now, don't you act smart with me, Jesse," was silly, coming from Rosco. Jesse wasn't _acting_ smart, he _was_ smart, and compared to Rosco he was a plumb genius. "You know what I'm talking about."

"Sure I do," Jesse's voice was high and wheedling. "You're talking gibberish."

Except, of course, the problem was that he wasn't. He was making clear accusations about what they did for a living. The only thing he had wrong was where they did it.

(Oh, but there had been burlap sacks filled with fermenting corn in some of the dark storage areas of the barn. There was nothing illegal about letting your corn go to seed, nothing Rosco could charge them with even if he'd known what was there. And there was more corn fermenting in their root cellar right now, just about literally under Rosco's feet. If only he knew where to look.)

Shouldn't have been that surprising, really. Everyone for three counties around (and some from beyond that) knew what the Dukes did for a living. And no one but the Dukes knew exactly where they did it or how they got away with it. Thing was, Rosco hadn't ever cared much what they did before, and now he was somehow accusing them of doing it in their own barn? He hadn't come up with that on his own. Someone else was giving him ideas.

"He ain't talking gibberish, Uncle Jesse. He's just like one of them parrot birds. Repeating what he hears," Luke suggested. "Ain't you, Rosco?"

"Ij!" Rosco answered and it was as good as admitting guilt.

"I don't suppose that you picked up that bunch of lies from a fat man in a white coat, did you Rosco?"

The sheriff's eyes flicked over to Bo, like he couldn't believe that kind of accusation could come from such a sweet little boy. Which only went to prove that Rosco didn't know Bo as well as he thought he did.

"I don't know what you're talking about." But, of course, he did.

"I can smell the cigar smoke from here," Bo informed him. "Your uniform reeks of it." Which was funny, because all Luke could smell was the soot on his hands. Well, under that there was Daisy's fried chicken, wafting from the house.

"Jit!" Rosco defended.

"Now, Bo, Luke, you just leave him be. I reckon he's just confused. Ain't you, Rosco?"

"Uh," Rosco answered, cleverly.

"See? I told you he was confused. Now, Rosco, it's lunch time. I reckon you'd best go back to town and see your mama so she can feed you."

"Ij!" Rosco repeated, his hand coming up to point at Jesse. Like he was going to tell him off (or shoot him with his finger), or at least defend some part of his honor. Then again, Daisy's cooking was starting to smell awfully tasty, and the sheriff must have known he'd worn out his welcome here. On a good day he might have been invited to the table. Today his best chance for a decent meal stood with doing exactly what Jesse told him to do. "All right, Jesse Duke." Hunger won out. "But you just, you remember who you're talking to," he added as a threat, even if he did head over to his poor, abused car so he could get back into town.

* * *

Enos Strate was a pest.

Rosco looked away from the fool. The one that stood as tall as he could (which was a fraction taller than Rosco and that was just annoying) and tried to maintain a serious frown when his face was born to smile. The sheriff let his eyes scan the empty squad room for a distraction, some underling upon whom to pawn off the youngster in front of him, but there wasn't one. No one dropping crumbs on the floor from a hastily eaten sandwich, no one banging spastically on any of the typewriters. No flash from the mug-shot camera, no one to shout a sardonic "cheese" at a freshly arrested perpetrator. (No freshly arrested perpetrators, either.)

Rosco sighed and turned back to the eager, unsolicited job-seeker in front of him. Enos Strate was a pest. But he was an enthusiastic, amateur pest. An untrained pest, because shadowing some soft-skinned, light duty sheriff down in Savannah sure as heck didn't teach him anything at all about dealing with the insanity of Hazzard County. A desperate pest who would willingly start at the bottom rung, who would do whatever was asked of him.

"I ain't got the money to pay you anything more than minimum wage," Rosco informed him. "And no overtime pay."

There it was, that smile that had been trying to break through the boy's serious face all along.

Enos Strate was a pest, but he could be a useful pest.

"Thank you, sir," the fool was saying, grabbing Rosco's hand. Pumping it up and down and he was just lucky that Rosco was in a relatively relaxed state. Going after his hand like that, the boy could've ended up bringing back a stump.

"Easy, Enos," he said, but it wasn't having an impact. "Just, settle down." That didn't work either, and Rosco's arm was starting to ache. It hadn't had that kind of a workout in easily twenty years. "You have to buy your own uniforms." That ought to put a pucker into that smile.

Except it didn't. "That ain't no problem," Enos assured him, hand still jerking his up and down. Sweat working up between their palms, which was just gross. "I've already got one from when I was in Savannah."

Rosco snatched his hand back, wiped it on his own uniform pants. Enos' uniform probably wouldn't be regulation, but that hardly mattered. Hazzard wasn't much of a regulation kind of a county.

The grin never stopped, no offense taken at the sudden end to the handshake. The boy simply set to twitching, his fingers curling and releasing like he was gripping an invisible steering wheel.

"You won't get a squad car," while he was thinking about it. "And don't expect no badge, neither."

Which didn't stop the eager nodding and fidgeting one bit.

Rosco sighed. "Raise your right hand," he said. "Your other right," he corrected and then began to recite the oath.

* * *

It was the quietest celebration date she'd ever been on. Then again, she hadn't been on a whole ton of dates. But she'd seen Chip Miller for a while in the eleventh grade and had accompanied him to rallies for the football team. And those had been big and loud and usually included a bonfire.

Maybe a quiet celebration was worth it if it smelled of musty library books instead of embers. She was just about sick of the smell of burnt things.

Enos was supposedly studying, like cramming for a test. That's what he said, anyway, when he called her to tell her the good news. That he'd talked Sheriff Coltrane into hiring him just like Daisy told him to, and that his job would start tomorrow. She'd suggested they celebrate, he'd said sure, as long as she met him at the library and let him read the code books for a bit, so he could make a good impression on the first day. Didn't seem like much of any date she'd ever read about in a romance novel, but it fit. It was practically tradition by now that she and Enos had their dates at that one table in the back, just past the periodicals.

But he wasn't studying. Not anything he was supposed to be and he hadn't since the minute she'd walked in. Wearing the platform heels she'd worn to graduation and a summer sundress that Jesse said looked pretty on her. Enos was in khakis instead of jeans, which might have been his concession to it being a date. Otherwise he was in his usual brown and tan plaid, and his loafers.

And if he was studying anything at all, it was her face.

"You excited?" she whispered. Because he was starting the only job he'd ever really wanted in his whole life, and if it had been her, she wouldn't have been able to sit still.

"Yes," he said back, smiling, his eyes staring into hers without blinking or moving. It was… intense, was what it was.

"You want me to quiz you on the codes?" she asked, then frowned at herself. It probably sounded silly, like some kind of a school thing. Like flashcards, and how old had she been the last time she used those? Maybe twelve.

"Sure, Daisy," he answered. "That would be great."

But he didn't look away from her eyes or turn the book to face her. Just kept right on staring at her and she was starting to wonder how long he could go without blinking.

She looked away, because it was too much. Dizzying, like having all the air around her sucked away and still trying to breathe, like her heart throbbing in her ears. Reached out for the open book in front of him that was a slim paperback in contrast to the stone-heavy volumes he'd been working his way through most times she's seen him here. She scanned the pages for anything at all that she could ask him, turned a few. Pressed the book flat open on the table and started reading a section out loud, even if the words didn't mean much of anything at all to her. Just plodding forward through a sentence about parking violations when movement caught the corner of her eye. She stumbled over a word at the same time that she felt the warmth of Enos' pinky rubbing up against hers. Tried to ignore it, tried to keep reading, then his hand slid over hers, holding on, and she let out a little squeak in spite of herself.

She'd spent time with boys since she was in the tenth grade, and she'd had her hand held before. Been kissed, too, and some of the fresher boys had tried to put their hands on her in other places. (Bo had gotten suspended twice for teaching those sorts of boys a lesson. And those boys were just lucky that Luke was away in the Marines at the time.) She knew what it was like to be in close quarters with boys that she liked, and she'd been more than a little disappointed that Enos hadn't even tried to kiss her cheek yet. And now, here it was, just his hand on hers, and she was squealing like a little girl.

She made her eyes focus on the book and she tried reading again. Didn't know if what she was saying made a lick of sense or not, whether it sounded like Greek. Thought about the heat of his hand over hers, the way it almost tingled and the feeling was making its way up her arm—

And then she really did squeal, and jump a little, too. Brought her hand back from where it had been holding down the corner of the book, just trying to get her feet under her. Flight or fight, but it was just old I. Young, standing by the stacks and glowering at the two of them. Her only guests, as usual, and apparently she'd slipped up on their little study session, then cleared her throat. Which was what had startled Daisy, made her recoil and though her hand was still warm, it wasn't anywhere near Enos'.

Mean look from I. Young, who apparently didn't like displays of affection in her library. Maybe she figured that the stacks would somehow be sullied by a little hand holding. Maybe she was trying to protect the books' virtue, though Daisy knew for a fact that there were some pretty tawdry romances on the fiction shelf. Then again, Enos and Daisy weren't too far from the children's section; maybe I. Young was worried that Dick and Jane would see more than they were meant to.

Daisy let out a silly little giggle at her own thoughts (or maybe it was just her nerves, bubbling over), heard Enos' laugh echoing back at her.

"Just let us put away the books," she told I. Young. "And we'll be on our way." Because that was tradition, too. They met at the library and got themselves kicked out. Would seem like I. Young would have put a stop to Enos coming here at all by now. Then again, maybe it wasn't Enos that she had a problem with. Maybe it was Daisy.

It didn't matter, they had the few books he'd pulled out settled back on their shelves and were out in the front entranceway without having to speak to I. Young again. Just the two of them on the porch, looking at the concrete pillars and old, rusted out candle holder that now held a bird's nest. And out beyond that, where the clouds that had been building all day had closed ranks and started to rain. Drops pattering on the stone walkway that led out to the sidewalk, and the street beyond that. Moisture tangling in her hair, making it frizz out in all directions, and she swore inwardly that she'd never again cut it so short. Enos was looking at her again, probably wondering why he was spending time with her when there were other girls, older and wiser.

"You're as pretty as a rainbow tonight," he told her, and it could have been thundering, could have been a hurricane going on just beyond where they were standing and she wouldn't have heard it over the way the blood pounded in her ears. Her mouth was dry and her hands were sweaty.

Didn't seem to matter to Enos that her body was getting everything backwards from how it was supposed to go. He just took hold of her hand again. Held it like he couldn't tell it was slimy (and his was dry, kind of firm to the touch with a callus here and there), bent down and kissed her on the cheek.

So little and it was almost too much. Made her feel light on her feet, made her want to dance in the rain. But she didn't, she just stayed right where she was, smelling his aftershave, feeling the warmth of his hand in hers and wondering how long they could get away with hiding out here in their own private corner of nowhere before the world caught up to them again.


	8. Boars and Hoggs and Sows

**Eight: Boars and Hoggs and Sows**

 _July 11, 1974_

It had been a while and then again, it could have been just yesterday, the last time he felt like this. Mostly in the dark, half ready to douse what little light they had, because there were noises. Cracks of sticks, rattle like a stone had been kicked.

They were fools, Luke and his Uncle Jesse were. Honest fools who needed to do exactly what they were doing, but it was dangerous. Risky, and he didn't even quite know how bad it really was. What kind of enemy they were up against and—

That was stupid. That was just military training taking over and pushing common sense aside. All they were doing was brewing up a little moonshine. Making a living at one in the morning because it was what Dukes did. And what they had to keep doing, regardless of whatever else was going on in their lives, because they had bills. And expenses, more than usual, what with needing to buy lumber and hardware and corrugated tin. Needing all the makings of a new barn and they'd already lost plenty of cooking time to the fire. Him and his smoke-sore lungs, Bo's hands, Jesse's refusal to leave them for even one night.

Cooking could be a one-man activity. Had been for most of the cousins' childhoods, when Uncle Jesse had made the family's living on his own. It was better with two, and when he was no older than thirteen, Luke had started helping with brewing when he could. Which was mainly in the summer, because education came first. Two moonshiners was good, made things go faster and smoother, not to mention the shared burdens of lifting and carrying. Moonshining could be done with three, too, though there were ways in which that many was awkward. Someone was almost always left idle while the other two did the work. Which turned out fine most of the time, when Bo was perfectly willing to volunteer to be the lazy one.

But they'd left Bo behind tonight – funny how he didn't complain about being left out when it meant he could sleep instead of working – so it was just the two of them: him and Jesse and every damn noise in the forest. Leaves and animals, maybe an acorn or two falling. Smell of the fire under the blackened copper of the pot, and Luke was wiping his hands on his back pockets. Sweaty when it wasn't even a hot night. He looked over at Jesse, at how the fire's glow deepened all those crow's feet that danced around his eyes and lips, at the smudge of soot on his cheek. Accidental mess, they always got dirty out here, but maybe he'd seen all the soot he ever wanted to.

"Go on," Jesse whispered to him, quieter than the wind. A nod to reinforce what he'd barely heard, and Luke was moving. Off into the shadows, where he was more comfortable. Where Jesse knew he longed to be, because sitting within the circle of the fire's glow left him vulnerable. Left them both at risk for sneak attack, and Luke would have liked to call himself a fool for even having the thought. Some remnant of his battle training, of nights in far worse places with far more dangerous enemies, on the far side of the world.

Hypervigilance, a lot of guys came back from the war that way. Luke had too, for a while, but Bo had calmed him. Without even meaning to, just by being easygoing, trusting, cheerful, his youngest cousin had reminded him that most people were good and most situations were safe.

Luke would have liked to think he was just having a relapse to those nervous first months home, but it wasn't that simple. Their barn had burned, and no part of him thought it was accidental. There had been interest shown in their land, and more than that, there was the chance that J.D. Hogg knew that the particular piece of land where Luke and his Uncle Jesse stood was technically Duke land, even if it was far from the farm. Aunt Lavinia's land, passed down, and if Hogg wanted it, the easiest way to get it would be to flush them out. To find the exact location of the still and spook them right into some revenuer's arms. Into prison time and fines and they'd have to sell the land cheap then.

So Luke went on patrol. Compound bow in his hand, bolo knife at his hip. Wasn't half the artillery he was used to, but it was enough. He had to keep reminding himself that. Had to keep his head straight about what he was looking for, what he'd do if he found it. How you didn't use an M-16 on the likes of J.D. Hogg, heck, you didn't fire anything at all directly at him. You didn't shoot to kill, just to scare. Had to remember that, but the thick shadows and the creak of the trees and the smell of wood smoke on his own skin made it difficult.

Trip wires, he knew where they all were. He'd laid them and he avoided them now. Stepped outside the radius of the still site and started his rounds. His ears did the work his eyes couldn't; picking out the sounds of the overhead leaves rustling, the stream burbling, crickets and cicadas, the fading crackle of Jesse's fire, and ruled them out. Listening for something less rhythmic, more like sudden and jarring, and he put one foot in front of the other. Left hand loosely grasping his bow, nose raised to the wind, but all he could smell was the dang smoke.

By the time the lazy, late-rising quarter moon had finally climbed respectably high, and the first soupy gray was starting to seep into the thick blackness of the sky, Luke had patrolled in circles and spirals and oblongs, never taking the same route twice. The birds would be up soon, making one hell of a racket, but for now things had quieted. Settled. He'd checked in on Jesse here and there, found him snoozing on the last pass, but the mash was cooking just fine without his uncle's old eyes watching it. He'd just about figured that the night had been full of nothing more dangerous than his own imagination when he heard a distinct crack. Not a pop or a peep or a chirp, nothing that could be blamed on one of the small critters of the forest, but a crack.

A twig breaking under a foot.

It was good, he told himself as he moved swiftly and silently toward the where he thought the sound had emanated. At least now he knew his nerves had good reason to be on edge. Cowboy boots weren't the same as combat boots, but they could be just as quiet when they had to be, when there was a still nearby and everything relied on it not being discovered by the wrong person.

Sweat trickling down from his hair into his collar, lungs burning from the shallow breaths that were all that he allowed himself, right arm almost aching from the way he was forcing it to be slow and smooth with retrieving the arrow from his quiver, nocking it. Moving, straining his eyes to see through the blanket of darkness, to find the enemy around the haphazard growth that he was tracking through.

Another crack, further away than he would have guessed, closer than he liked. Whoever it might be was making their way up along the creek, toward Jesse and the still. Headed for the trip line and the rattle of bottles would probably startle Jesse awake. Worse if it didn't – the old shotgun that had been Jesse's father's before him rested at his uncle's side. If the enemy got hold of it first—

Luke picked up his pace, gave up worrying about silence when the threat was just about on top of Jesse anyway. There was no hiding the still anymore, all that was left now was damage control, trying not to let anyone kill or get killed and—

Crack! again, a little louder, dried leaves rustling. Still couldn't see who it was or whether they were armed. Didn't know whether to shout out and try to scare them or maintain what element of surprise he still had. Kept his quiet, kept moving.

Smell of sweat and smoke, something else under that that he didn't have time to think about. Sound of feet moving, not his own, but he was close to them and they were close to Uncle Jesse and the still—

A gasp, his own. Bitten back from the holler he'd almost let out, his heart in his throat and his throat on fire, tightened down like every other muscle in his body. A laugh tried to follow, fraught with nerves because there the enemy was. Waddling off toward the briars and undergrowth that ran parallel to the stream.

A foursome of wild boar. One male for sure and the others were smaller, hard to tell. Probably sows. They'd been making their way up the creek, because they knew something good when they smelled it. After Jesse's fermented corn mixture, no doubt.

Luke raised his bow anyway, and considered it. Carrying a carcass through the forest would be a burden, but it was manageable and would lend a sense of legitimacy to him and Jesse emerging from the woods around dawn, if anyone saw them. Besides, Bo was partial to Boar meat.

But the angle wasn't the best and the hogs were trundling off as quickly as their chubby little legs would take them. He couldn't be sure of a clean kill and a squealing pig could be as bad as a rifle shot, as far as drawing stranger toward the hidden still. So he leaned against a tree to catch his breath, and watched as the animals disappeared into the shadows hidden within other shadows.

* * *

 _July 12, 1974_

Luke was tired, and that was the least of it. Harassed and halfway angry. Sweating and not-quite-cursing, because he valued his hide and didn't want it whipped.

And if he'd only let Bo help him, maybe it would go faster. (If he'd only take a day off, he wouldn't be so dang tired. But Luke didn't believe in days off anymore. Not after the Marines. Not even Sundays, when he was supposed to refrain from doing much more than attending church and visiting around town.) But he wouldn't, and there he was, tossing another melted bit of something off into one pile. Anything metal and large enough to be salvaged at all was going to the Hazzard Garage, where old Henry Davenport could smelt it into something useful.

"I got a left hand," Bo announced. Figured it sounded funny, when he'd always had a left hand and everybody knew it, too. But Luke knew what he meant, even if he only used half the words.

Sarcastic half smile. "Yeah, and you can't hardly manage to use it for nothing, either." Which wasn't fair. He could, if he absolutely had to. Sure, eating hadn't exactly gone smoothly and more than once he'd eschewed the fork (but then again, he seemed to have a free pass from Jesse to do it if he needed to, and he wasn't one to be wasteful of such opportunities) in favor of his fingers. But he'd still gotten the food into his mouth, hadn't he? "Besides, Doc said to keep that right one clean until it was fully healed. And I don't reckon that none of this is clean."

No, it wasn't. It was the well-charred bottom of the pile, the last of the rubble. The mucky, ash-and-soot covered bits of things that had either been on the floor of the barn to begin with, or had dropped down there somewhere in the worst of the flames. The smell of burnt things was, if anything, worse than before, but soon enough they'd be able to rake dirt over what was left and smother the smell like they'd tried to smother the flames last week. (Or Luke would, anyway. Bo's right hand still had scabs and peeling skin on it, and his left hand had just been deemed useless.) The melted plastic and rubber from tires and hoses had been the worst of it, Bo figured. And yesterday Luke had pulled the latch from Aunt Lavinia's cedar chest out of the mess and tossed it onto the garage pile.

All the proof they needed that everything that had once been their aunt's was gone now. And just maybe that was why Jesse hadn't been out here sorting through the rubble since that first day. There were pieces of things that he didn't want to see in ruins, most likely.

"Since when are you so all-fired interested in doing an honest day's work, anyway?"

Now that wasn't fair. Bo did plenty of work around here and as far as he recalled, Luke had missed doing his share of work for a couple of years. Oh, sure, there was that whole excuse about Marines and war and all, but Bo had pulled the load all by himself for long enough that it ought to count for something. He was about to offer up a dissertation on the subject when the whine of an overused engine interrupted him. Dang it all, he was about sick of—

He stood up off the milking stump to his full height and turned toward the sound of an engine. He was about dang sick of being interrupted out here when he and Luke were working.

But it wasn't a white cruiser (or even a mud-colored cruiser), it was a smog-spewing, pinkish pickup held together by bondo paint, the occasional rusty bolt, a wish and about three prayers. Rounded at the edges, heavy as a boulder (and about as agile, too) and old enough that it probably belonged in a museum. Bouncing over the road that had been rutted and eroded by Monday night's thunderstorms. Two heads, one of them bobbing ridiculously, and he turned to look at Luke. Who was, as absurd as it was, using soot blackened fingers to tuck in the hem of his shirt as he stepped forward out of the last of the debris. Running those same awful fingers through his hair in some attempt to straighten out the tight curls he always got when he was sweaty, and all he was doing was spreading dirt everywhere. (Luke just shouldn't even try to be pretty. He couldn't manage it no matter what he did. Especially when he stood next to Bo.)

The screen door on the porch screeched open; Daisy, followed by Jesse, both of them summoned out by the coughing backfire of that poor truck. On the back side of the house, the hounds set to baying.

"Dang it," Bo mumbled. Figured no one heard him, because at the same time, Jesse called out—

"There's Molly."

"And Alice," Daisy added and she even sounded excited about it. Which was dumb. Molly dragged trouble around with her like it was loaded into the bed of that sorry excuse of a pickup every time she left her home in the swamp. And her cousin Alice was just—

"Looks like your girlfriend's coming for a visit," Luke muttered from behind a stiff, false smile of greeting.

"She ain't my girlfriend," and Luke couldn't stand her any more than he could. Not if he was honest, but right about now Luke wasn't anything more than a pain in his neck.

"Reckon she will be before she leaves here. She aims to have you and I don't reckon there's too many men that tell Miss Alice there no." Luke was more than a pain in his neck, he was a pain in his—"Least, not any that live to tell the tale."

"Shut up, Luke." Then he smiled like he was supposed to, or tried. Could only feel it on one side of his face, like the other just wasn't willing to play along with this charade.

The truck let out a foul-smelling belch of black smoke and settled, then Molly kicked open her door with a force that was unexpected from someone so gray and thin. Frail-looking, but it was false advertising. Anyone who lived in the swamp had to be tough as nails, and Molly was crafty, too. Slick and only as honest as it suited her to be.

But she was Jesse's friend and the Dukes had to be nice to her every time she showed up. Besides, she was fine, mostly. Kind of fun, even.

It was Alice, bursting out of the other side of the truck like a bull through a fence, that was the problem. Everything Molly was, Alice wasn't in the least. Including smart. The girl couldn't take a dang hint if it hit her over the head like a two-by-four. And any second now she was going to make a beeline for Bo, wrap her meaty arms around him and squeeze him in the sort of bear hug that no woman had a right to be able to muster up.

Except she didn't. She lumbered along right on Molly's heels as Molly all but ran to Jesse. It was only then that Bo noticed the frazzled gray bun that had fallen half loose, the apron tied around Molly's belly like she'd forgotten to take it off, and the pale tone to her coloring.

"Jess," she called, and threw her small arms around as much of his belly as they'd reach. "We got trouble." A damsel in distress if he ever did see one, but Molly, she could play a good role. She could have made a career on the stage and then again…

Jesse's eyes rolled, but his arms went around her just the same. "All right, Molly. We'll help you if we can."

As if the Dukes didn't have enough problems, now Uncle Jesse had gone and agreed to take on someone else's. (And that someone else's cousin's, too.)


	9. Headed for Hades in a Pocketbook

**Nine: Headed for Hades in a Pocketbook**

 _July 13, 1974_

 _We cook in our kitchen, Rosco_. That was what Jesse Duke said, and that had been the undeniable truth.

Jesse Duke was an honest man, and anyone in three counties (and possibly three states) would attest to that. He came from trustworthy stock and his father had been unforgiving on that account. There were silences between Jesse's words that had meanings all their own, but when it came right down to it, Dukes told the truth.

But there were other truths, and it was up to Rosco to find them. At least that was what J.D. Hogg said.

J.D. Hogg, he could wax eloquent. He could take regular words and make them sound important just by the tone of his voice and the jut of his chest (or belly – hard to know where one ended and the other began). He could go on for hours with only the slightest pause for breath (or to drag on the cigar that was always tightly jammed between his fat fingers) and at the end it would be like those classroom lectures from long ago. Relief that it was over, a sense that something should have been learned – anything at all – and the disappointing realization that it was all wasted time. Nothing had been said.

But concealed in all that blabber there were lies and manipulations, because J.D. Hogg was not an honest man. He was a schemer and a conniver, he was smart, and he was becoming far too powerful to ignore.

And that was why Rosco had left his rookie, Enos Strate, back at the station. Told him to clean the jail cells and otherwise rid the place of the musty smell of summer, to study the mug books and to answer the phones if they rang. He figured he'd properly train the kid another day. Because J.D. Hogg wanted Rosco, for undisclosed but mostly obvious reasons, to catch the Dukes breaking the law. Which they technically did all the time and it didn't hurt anybody. Helped quite a few, if you believed some of the tales that floated around the ragged edges of the county about the medicinal qualities of Jesse Duke's moonshine.

All the same, Rosco had stationed himself up on Settler's Ridge with a pair of binoculars. The sun burned into the back of his neck and hands as he lay in the sparse grass and breathed in the odd scent of dust mixed with wildflowers and his own sweat. And squinted into the eyepieces at the Duke farm, which spread out below him in its weatherworn glory. Shades of green, yellow, beige and brown, interrupted by the gray-white of the farmhouse itself, the faded wood of the shed and side barn, and a black scar where the main barn had been. And cars, too many cars, too many bodies.

Rosco had half figured that J.D. Hogg was talking through his white, perfectly maintained hat when it came to the Dukes being up to no good. All the same, J.D. had been whittling away at his good sense, had come back time and time again with his badmouthing and his threats (and his pouty jowls that somehow tempted Rosco to grab hold of them and find out whether they were as soft as they looked) and he'd worn him down.

And right about now, he reckoned that J.D. Hogg might just be a genius.

Because right down there on the Dukes' kitchen porch, was Molly Snodgrass. Cozied up to Jesse Duke, and they were doing something – hard to say what. Something with their hands and it was too small to see, even with the binoculars. There was a bowl in front of them and they tossed something into it every now and then. If Rosco didn't know better, he'd think they were shelling peas. But Molly Snodgrass, well. She wasn't a regular woman, and she didn't do regular things. She was trouble, and Rocso would be more likely to believe that she was mixing up a potion of poison than doing something as simple as shelling peas.

Molly was a moonshiner, sure. But she was more than that, she was—

The thing was, Rosco didn't exactly know what Molly Snodgrass was, other than a bit creepy, a little off. Less than civilized, and she lived in the swamp. That alone made her suspect. But add to it that she had a bunch of kin – nephews and nieces and cousins, but no children of her own – that came and went through her house. And some of them were pretty rough and plenty crazy and made those Duke cousins look tame and cultured by comparison. Molly, by her very nature, was trouble. And if Jesse Duke had taken up with her (and the way they sat there was one thing, but more damning than that was the way their cars were intermingled in what passed as the Dukes' driveway, like the two households had been tidily merged) then there was no telling just exactly what kind of damage the two of them could do together.

Add to that the way Luke Duke was off to the side, fussing around with the blackened remains of a barn. Daisy Duke was close to him, handing off this or that as they sorted through, and between the two of them, they were hiding evidence. Disguising all the clues to what those Dukes had done in there. Moonshining, maybe, but then if Molly Snodgrass was involved, it could be just about anything.

Then there was the most damning evidence of all. Bo Duke, who was under doctor's orders to be resting and recuperating from injuries that he supposedly sustained while fighting the fire (but could as easily have gotten while setting it) was actively courting Alice Snodgrass, white of the gauze wrapped around his right hand glowing in the sunlight. Another one of the swamp family and she wasn't pretty or sexy or anything at all like the girls Bo Duke had dated since he was thirteen. But all the same, she was all snuggled up to his side on a farmyard stump that wasn't even big enough for one. All cuddly and cute as anything. Yep.

If the Dukes and the Snodgrasses were working together, anything could happen. And if Bo and Alice got any closer together down there, they could be making little Dukegrasses or Snoddukes, and then the whole county would be headed for Hades in a pocketbook.

* * *

 _July 15, 1974_

"Do you have a resume, sweetie?"

Daisy fought for a smile. Figured her face went through a few other emotions, first. Confusion, worry. Mild upset, even, but she made it all the way through to a smile. Head up, shoulders squared, at least as much as she could manage when the narrow shoulder strap on her dress wanted to slip down. Hands relaxing out of how they'd been clenched in front of her. "Why no," she said and tried to sound like it was perfectly normal. Like she had expected to be asked the question when she hadn't.

She'd taken her own advice, sort of. All those things she'd told Enos about just marching into the Sheriff's station and demanding a job, but she wasn't like her boyfriend. (She'd decided, after their last date, that it was safe to think of Enos that way. Then she'd startled herself with the realization that she had a boyfriend at all, when she'd never had one before. Not really.) She didn't have specific skills or training, and she didn't have a single job in mind. She just knew she needed one, even more than before. There was a barn to rebuild, lost earnings to make up, a doctor bill for her cousins. And Bo was close enough to healed that she could stop trying to stay at home to care for him.

Besides, Molly and Alice were staying with the family. Indefinitely. Something about sabotage and their stills, gunshots of unknown origin, missing livestock, and most of all, fear for their safety. That was the official story, anyway. Jesse seemed to be accepting it, if not entirely believing it, for now. In the light of the Dukes' own troubles, it seemed best to err on the side of caution, anyway. So the family had houseguests and she had roommates, and there were two more mouths to feed. Molly and Alice (mostly Molly) were contributing to the household chores, but what with their lack of livestock, they had nothing material to offer.

Anyway, she had to admit that she just wanted to get out of the house. Sharing her room with the occasional female guest for a night here and there had always been fun. Molly and Alice weren't so much fun as big and clumsy and demanding in a quiet sort of way. Not-quite-complaining about the size of her bed (which was never meant to fit three in the first place) until she gave it up to them and dug Bo's sleeping bag out of the boys' closet. She'd been relegated to her own floor, and that was before she got mostly kicked out of her own kitchen. And the bathroom, well. For someone who hardly combed her hair, much less wore any makeup, Alice could spend hours in the bathroom.

Then there was Alice's fear of dogs (which was ridiculous when the woman's claim to fame was that she wrestled _alligators_ , of all things) which had gotten the hounds sent over to the Wilsons' place in Black Hollow, because that family had a kennel and a love of animals. And because they were lifelong friends of the Dukes, and more than willing to be helpful.

Finally, there was Alice chasing after Bo and Molly clinging to Jesse while Luke was at turns amused and annoyed by it all. Daisy needed eight hours a day outside her own house just to survive it.

"I don't have a resume," she said, forcing her smile to be wider. She'd already inquired after work at the diner ( _no, thanks, we're got all the shifts covered_ ) and the dry goods store ( _can you drive a forklift and are you over twenty-one?_ ) and the butcher ( _check back around Christmas when things'll be busy_ ). Now she was at what felt like her last resort: the office of the new lawyer who had just set up business in town. John W. Summerall, Esq., which all by itself sounded exciting, even before she met the man. She'd figured on convincing him that he needed a secretary, but the woman in front of her seemed to be filling that position. Maybe it was for the best, since she didn't have the first idea how to type or take dictation. "But I work hard. And I'm smart and I learn fast. I was one of the top five students at Hazzard High." She could be a receptionist, maybe. Or a file girl or a gal Friday. She could get coffee, at the very least.

"All right," the lady in front of her said. With her tidy pink suit and matching pumps, her dark hair pulled up into an intimidating bun. Dark-framed glasses that made her look smart, but she was still pretty enough. Daisy could be just like her, given a few years to grow into the position and the money to dress like that. (And enough hair to put into a bun, but that would be easier than all the rest. Whether she ever got a job or not, her hair would grow out eventually, and none too soon for her tastes.) "I'll go in and speak to Mr. Summerall." The secretary's voice was soft and pleasant, but conveyed plenty of authority all the same. Or maybe it was just that, when she stood up from the yellow swivel chair behind her spindly-legged desk, she towered over Daisy. Made her feel like a kid who'd need a phonebook under her backside in order to sit at the grownups' table. "And find out if he'll see you without an appointment."

Daisy was pretty sure she'd just been scolded.

The woman, who hadn't offered a name and didn't have any identifying signs on her desk, walked off and let herself into an office door, then closed it behind her. Which left Daisy to try to think up anything at all to say that would get her this job. She stared at the heavy, black phone on the desk, the typewriter and notepad, and thought of all she could do. She'd been raised on a farm, so she had strong, sure hands. She could cook, she could make a fine pot of coffee, she could milk a goat and ride a horse like nobody's business. She had dealt with Bo and Luke for most of her life, so she could be diplomatic, and then again she could just plain stand her ground when she needed to. Her vegetable garden was probably the best in Hazzard, and—

None of this was going to get her anywhere with John W. Summerall, Esq. Which was a shame, because the idea of trying to get this job was born out of desperation. But as she'd walked across Hazzard Square, along the diagonal sidewalk and up, over the gazebo steps, she'd realized how absolutely perfect it would be. Right here in the small, brick building that abutted the Hazzard Courthouse on the east side, and the location couldn't be beaten. She could look out the small window from time to time, and maybe she'd see Enos, strutting around the square in his uniform. Giving directions to strangers and helping ladies across the street, scolding kids who rode too quickly on their bicycles. And somewhere around 12:30 each day, she could step out onto the concrete of the sidewalk and Enos would be there to meet her. They could stroll over to the benches on the square and share a picnic lunch that she'd bring special.

"I'm sorry," woke her up out of her reverie. The tall secretary was back. "Mr. Summerall says he doesn't plan to hire anyone at this time."

"But I'm sure I could be a big help," Daisy tried. Because in the span of minutes this job had become too big of a dream to give up. "I'd—"

"Sweetie," the woman said, and Daisy tried not to let hot tears come to her eyes. Not here, not now. "Best thing you can do for yourself is go to secretarial school. And write yourself up a resume."

"Thank you," she managed, then turned on the heel of her low shoes. Walked out as quickly as she could, with the strap of her dress falling down toward her elbow. Around the corner and into the alley, opening the door to the pickup she'd borrowed from her cousins to come into town, and it was only then that she let herself cry.

* * *

 _July 17, 1974_

Guests were, by their very definition, temporary. And family friends with any brains ought to know to be very temporary guests, if they wanted to stay friends. But here the whole bunch of them were, five days later, and Molly hadn't taken a single one of the hints that Luke had thrown at her. (Jesse, well, Jesse had taken them all. And though he'd occasionally glared at his halfway-rude nephew, he hadn't tried to put a stop to those hints. Luke would wager that he was secretly hoping they'd have the intended effect and send their guests back to the swamp.) Molly was still taking up space in Daisy's room at night, at the kitchen table three times a day, and all but glued to Jesse's side everywhere in between. Professing to be frightened of whoever she thought was threatening her back in the swamp, but she acted more smitten than scared.

Alice was trying to behave exactly the same way with Bo. Or, no, not quite. She wasn't nearly as skilled as Molly, didn't know how to portray herself as scared and wilting. She just kept asking if he'd help her with her wrestling moves. The woman could wrestle a gator into submission, but she was supposed to be afraid of the swamp. Hell, the swamp was probably more scared of her than she was of it.

Maybe Luke used to get annoyed when he was twelve and Bo followed him everywhere. Joining in on games he wasn't nearly big enough to properly play and getting himself hurt. Luke halfway carrying him home and then getting yelled at for his trouble, for letting Bo get hurt in the first place. (Letting, ha. That was almost funny.) And maybe, a few years later, when his cousin could keep up on his own, he hadn't minded being tailed quite so much. Maybe he'd missed Bo in those Marine years spent away from home, and maybe he'd been a little surprised to come back and find that his baby cousin didn't need him quite so much. Maybe they'd figured it out after a while and Bo had become his constant companion all over again. Maybe he'd gotten a little too used to having Bo all to himself, and maybe he wasn't too keen on the way Alice was trying to wedge her way between them.

Then again, if there was one thing the military had taught him, it was how to turn a liability into an asset.

"Hey Bo," he whispered. Because it was dark and late, because they were supposed to be sleeping. Because the walls in the old farmhouse weren't as thick as he might have liked and Molly and Alice had commandeered Daisy's bed, which was only one room over.

"Hmm?" Bo answered, and Luke could hear the creak of his sorely abused mattress. Rolling over or stretching out; either way, Bo was plenty awake.

"Me and Jesse need to get away for another cook." And a delivery at some point, too. But mentioning that part would only ensure that his plan didn't stand a chance of working.

"Good luck with that. Molly ain't about to let him out of her sight."

"Exactly." But they needed to get away from her, because Molly and Alice might be friends (in some definition of the word that Jesse understood, but Luke was still a bit shady on) but they were also competitors. They couldn't know where the Dukes' still was, their recipe, or who their customers were. "But if we don't cook, we ain't got nothing to sell. And if we don't sell…"

"We ain't got nothing to eat." Leave it to Bo to think of it that way. Still, it worked in Luke's favor that he did. He'd do just about anything to keep his belly full.

"Right. And you ever notice how Molly don't let Alice out of her sight?"

"Molly don't let Jesse out of her sight."

"Yeah, but when she has to choose between the two," like when Jesse took Maudine out to pull up stumps the other day, "she stays with Alice."

"Yeah? So?"

"Reckon you could keep Alice busy some night? Like maybe take her on a date or something?"

The mattress over there did more than squeal. It more like screamed, and Bo had to be sitting up.

"What, are you nuts? Luke, I ain't gonna—"

"Shh," Luke counseled. "They'll hear you." Molly, Alice, Daisy, heck their nearest neighbors in Chickasaw would hear him if Bo got any louder.

"You take her out," Bo snapped at him. The mattress did some more complaining and Luke could just see the shadow of Bo's shape lying back down and turning resolutely away from him. Disgust so thorough Luke could just about taste it.

He ran a hand through his hair. "She don't like me."

"I don't like her," Bo answered back. "And how would I explain her to anybody I might see? This is Alice, she's only half as crazy as she seems? That's still plenty crazy Luke and I—"

"Shh," he hissed again. "You ain't got to take her nowhere public. Better if you don't. Just take her out in the fields to stargaze or something. Make it easy for Molly to follow you two. Then me and Jesse can slip away."

"Oh, sure. Fine. Take her out in the fields where there won't be no witnesses. She'll think she can—"

"She ain't gonna hurt you, Bo. You can handle her." At least Luke figured he could. Besides, if things got too rough Molly would intervene. Probably. "You got a better idea?"

"No," Bo answered him back, miserably.

"Well, if you come up with one, let me know. Otherwise, I reckon you're going to have to take Miss Alice out on a date tomorrow night or the next one after that."

Bo's lips vibrated against each other in a long raspberry to explain exactly how he felt about that.


	10. The Bravest Fool in Hazzard

**Ten: The Bravest Fool in Hazzard  
**

 _July 20, 1974_

Rosco might have been crazy, and if anyone accused him of that very crime, he wouldn't have been able to defend himself.

It had started simply enough, one evening when he'd gone prowling through the filing cabinets in the dim storage room in the far, cobwebby corner of the sheriff's station. Straight to the drawer marked with a blocky and faded S-T, digging through for Snodgrass. Coughing on the dust he'd disturbed and squinting in the angular light to read carbon copies of old reports. Crumbling papers with browned edges, some of them handwritten in a flowing cursive that would make a schoolmarm proud (but made Rosco's eyes hurt). A checkered family history laid out on paper: Horace Snodgrass spending the night in jail to sober up after getting into an unexplained altercation with a deer, Molly Snodgrass being charged with evading arrest when she refused to pull over for a police car with lights and sirens, Henry Snodgrass having an unfortunate tendency to get arrested for indecent exposure. All from the early 1950s and Rosco could remember one or two of those. He'd been a deputy then.

Further back there hadn't been as many reports, but that was in the days of Sheriff Morris, who hadn't been a fan of paperwork. There was one about Ephraim Snodgrass from '44, and he was Molly's brother, Rosco thought. Anyway, he had been detained for contraband, but what exactly he'd been smuggling seemed to be lost to the report's torn off edge, which had probably long since crumbled to nothing at all. There was an even older report from Millicent Snodgrass (Molly's mother, Rosco recalled) who was making a complaint against one Ivy Culpepper for theft of vehicle, which was a nice change of pace, and then it was back to the Snodgrasses being the troublemakers.

And then there was that report from October 1936, where young Molly Snodgrass, all of eighteen years old, had been arrested for interfering with a Federal investigation. There were pages missing and smudges on what was still there. A growth that looked like mildew right in the middle of the narrative of the report, but Rosco could figure it out well enough. The Feds had been in pursuit of a vehicle driven along Cutler Ridge and presumed to be carrying moonshine, when a 1928, half-ton Chevrolet pickup truck had suddenly pulled across the road between the pursuers and the quarry. The young, female driver had been full of apologies and stories about being lost and confused. She'd had no idea that she was pulling out in front of a Federal vehicle and it sure wouldn't happen again. But she'd been charged anyway. Because the moonshine runner the frustrated Feds had been chasing had been one Jesse Duke, and they'd wanted him bad.

And that was where the crazy part came in. Maybe Rosco could blame it on the way the file room left him coughing, sneezing and a little bit dizzy. Or maybe it was the dinner he'd eaten later that night, which had come from the diner and was supposed to be turkey and mashed potatoes, but it hadn't tasted quite right and it hadn't settled well into his stomach, either.

Or the night of watered-down sleep that followed. Short snoozes interrupted by memories of being with Bessie Mae, two of them squeezed warmly together by the fireplace at that fancy restaurant he'd taken her to in Capital City. No reservation, so they'd had to sit and wait for a while, but the waiting area had been loveseat benches around an old stone hearth. They'd cuddled and he'd called her Messy Bay by mistake. She'd giggled, so he'd done it again and then the maître d' had come along to seat them. They'd eaten, and driven back the long route, past the view at Kissing Cliff. And when they'd gotten back to town there'd been Deputy Miller, waiting for him in front of his house. Some emergency or other that he couldn't even remember anymore, and he'd left Bessie Mae to get home on her own. Handled that emergency, then a dozen others in the days that followed and at the end of it all, his Messy Bay had up and left him. He'd made his decisions, he didn't regret them. But then again—

Maybe he was lonely, maybe he was tired. But the next morning he'd greeted Enos Strate, asked him to clean the dust out of the file room and promised to train him the next day.

Then he'd gotten in his squad car and driven over to the Boar's Nest, banged on the back door, and asked to see J.D. Hogg. No denying, that was crazy.

He found himself in the back-room office, the inner sanctum of a Hogg, as it were, alone with the man in question. All he'd had to say was: Molly Snodgrass. From there he wouldn't have been able to get another word in around the earful he was getting, anyway.

Liquor, drugs, firearms, shooting off firearms while under the influence of liquor and drugs. All the tales that could be told about the family, about half of which he'd already known and a tenth of which were included in the reports Rosco had read the day before. Finally, after about a half-hour diatribe from the man in white (who had been forced to pause long enough to get a new cigar going), Rosco was able to finish the sentence he started: Is staying with Jesse Duke.

Which got him fuzzy, impressed raised eyebrows, and then Hogg started up again. About how he'd always suspected, but never quite known for sure until now, that the Duke and Snodgrass families were in cahoots.

"Drugs and firearms, Rosco. And who knows how many Federal agents may have disappeared into the swamp. Is that what you want in your county?" Then he'd been sent on his way with the reminder that the election was less than two months away. After which, Hogg would most likely be his boss and that could be a good thing or a bad thing, depending on how Rosco handled himself in the intervening weeks.

All of which led to him lying in the dirt on his belly like a sunning snake. Once again, spending time on Settler's Ridge overlooking the Duke farm. Following movements that seemed orderly, anyway. Nothing he understood, but the scorched ground where the barn had been was clear now, mostly covered over with fresh dirt. And everything else seemed like normal farm activities. At least as far as Rosco knew, having never lived on a farm himself. He watched for two days (with promises to Enos Strate that he'd get him trained eventually and in the meantime, the office was starting to look and smell clean in a way that it never had, not as long as Rosco had worked there). Didn't see anything worth noting.

Until Saturday evening, after dinner. All the Dukes, as well as Molly and Alice Snodgrass, were sitting on the kitchen porch doing not much of anything, when Cooter Davenport showed up at the farm in his shiny, yellow road-hazard of a car. Got out and handed the keys over to Bo Duke, who turned and handed them to Alice Snodgrass. Said something, then he and Luke both stepped off the porch and trotted over to the far barn that still stood in the trees. Went inside but left the doors open. Before Rosco could get up and pick himself a new vantage point to try to see inside, he heard, almost felt though he was a good four acres away, the deep rumble of an engine. Then a growling roar, and a black car pulled out of the barn. A moonshine runner if ever Rosco saw one. Bo Duke driving, with Luke Duke hopping out of the passenger side to close the barn doors. Then Bo backed up until he was even with Cooter Davenport's car.

Alice exchanged some words with Cooter, then got into the driver's side of his hotrod. Molly joined her on the passenger side, and Jesse Duke said something to them all from the porch. Daisy came down to stand next to Cooter, who waved his hand in the air. Then there was nothing but thundering grumbles and dust as the two cars sped out of the Dukes' farmyard and down Old Mill Road.

Cooter Davenport screamed in delight, and Rosco figured the whole phenomenon was about the most suspicious thing he had ever seen. And cursed himself that there was no quick way from Settler's Ridge down to where his suspects were fleeing (and obviously up to no good) off into the setting sun.

* * *

In the end, he had to get Luke to give him one more day beyond the two he'd originally been granted. Then he had to insult Alice's honor and keep right on insulting it until she got mad enough to want to prove herself. _Then_ he had to talk Cooter out of his pretty Barracuda for one night. It was the most complex plan he'd even come up with and Bo figured that somewhere under all that smirking, Luke was proud of him.

"Watch the," Luke started, and he had a hand out like he was going to grab for the steering wheel. Oh, that was the other thing Bo had to do. Wheedle permission out of Jesse to take _Sweet Tilly_ out for anything other than a 'shine run. "Tree."

"I wasn't anywhere near that tree," Bo assured him.

And then he'd had to convince both Luke and Jesse that he could drive at all. That gripping a steering wheel wasn't going to hurt him any, when it had been more than two weeks since he burned his hands. Sure, he still had to put aloe on them a few times a day to keep the new skin from drying out, but they didn't hurt anymore (much) and besides, he could drive better with just one knee that Luke could with both hands. He'd be fine.

(He'd be more fine if Luke would just relax and enjoy the ride instead of barking out instructions and reaching for the wheel or the dashboard like he thought Bo was going to get him killed.)

They were riding down moonshine trails that their daddies had used back in their day. Half grown over by now, and Alice was hanging on back there in Cooter's car like a champ.

Because Bo had impugned her driving skills until she'd threatened to wrestle him to the ground. Then he'd challenged her to a race, instead. He'd procured her a car and made simple rules. If she could catch him, she could wrestle him. Then he'd thrown in the suggestion that Luke and Molly join them as navigators and co-drivers, and the race was on.

All he had to do was lose her. Just not yet, because Jesse was on his way to the still site in his pickup and going by whatever twisted route he figured would ensure that no one could follow him. Bo had to keep this little race away from anywhere Jesse might be. Which still gave him plenty of room to play.

"Go left!" Luke was hollering. Which was the direction he'd planned to go in the first place. So he made a right instead. "Dang it, Bo!"

"It'll be fine, Luke," he assured him with a smile. Turning to look at his sourpuss face because Luke Duke did not like to be defied. But one direction was as good as the other, give or take a creek bed that they'd have to deal with.

"I know we'll be fine," Luke informed him and it sounded dangerously like a compliment from his older cousin. "But you'd best make sure that Alice don't hurt Cooter's car." Because that was the agreement. They could borrow the Barracuda, as long as it came back in the same condition in which it left. (But Cooter was an easygoing sort. He'd trade a ding or two for a sip of Jesse's 'shine.)

 _Tilly_ was solid, but she was empty tonight. No extra weight, which kept her airborne over the creek bed. The Barracuda was lighter, but less stable. It caught more air than _Tilly_ did, came down a little rougher.

"You might have a point," Bo conceded. (Cooter wasn't _that_ easygoing, when it came right down to it. And he had a temper and quick fists, too.)

So he hooked a left at the next intersection of the old trails, caught sight of Alice in the car behind him, grinning as she made the turn every bit as smoothly as he had.

And then he played an easy game of follow-the-leader with her, over narrow bridges and through tunnels, down into hollows that had already darkened for the night. Keeping just enough ahead of her to say that he was winning, and otherwise making himself easy to follow.

"You ever going to get rid of her?" Luke asked after the chase had been boring for too long. Because he was born to complain, old Luke was.

"Soon," Bo assured him.

"You know you can't lose them in the swamp, right?"

Bo pressed his lips together, gave Luke a squint-eyed glare that asked him exactly how much of a fool he thought Bo was. (Don't answer that.) "Of course I know that." The Dukes knew the swamp better than anyone in Hazzard – except Molly.

Bo skirted around another turn, this time pulling onto the blacktop of Ridge Road. Heard the skitter of unsure wheels behind them and Luke laughed. "She's pretty good though," he said. Bo shook his head and gave Luke another look. "Oh, you're better," he admitted. "Now watch the road."

"The road'll stay right where it is without me watching it," Bo informed him. "Same place it's always been." And he didn't need to see it to know where it was.

"What on earth?" Luke said when they pulled onto State Route 31. "Either you're the bravest man in Hazzard, or you're a fool." Because State Route 31 led straight into Hazzard Square.

"I'm the bravest fool in Hazzard," Bo informed him.

Alice was good, and Molly knew all the old moonshine trails. Between them, they'd done a very good job of keeping up with him.

"You got a plan?" Luke asked.

"Something will come up," Bo assured him.

"Great plan."

It was, though. Because for all that they knew and could do, Molly and Alice were swamp folk. They had no idea how town worked. Like the traffic patterns in Hazzard Square. The last of the drivers pulling out of parallel parking spots to head home after a long day at work. The lovers strolling across the green. The rules of the road on the square and that one place where you could turn around and charge at your pursuer.

And the fact that the bakery's pies got delivered at exactly 7:18 every evening. By Elijah, driving his clunky old panel truck that he was lucky to get turned the right way, most nights. The truck was slow and rusty in places, and so was Elijah, which made them a fine pair and a complete disaster all at once.

"Oh, Lord," Luke said, when he saw Elijah swinging widely into the square as Bo took Alice on yet one more loop. "Be careful," he added, because he'd figured it out.

"Don't trust me to do it?"

"I trust you. I don't trust Elijah."

"I hope he's wearing his glasses, at least," Bo said as he squealed around a curb at one of the corners of the square. Smell of burnt rubber (and somewhere beyond that, he'd swear he smelled apple pie, even if was impossible) and he reversed course. Around in the opposite direction, ignoring the honk of a civilian who knew full well that Bo was disobeying the one way signs. Alice still trying to bring the Barracuda around to match his unexpected move, and she got honked at, too. "Come on, Elijah!"

Elijah might just have needed his encouragement. He'd slowed more than usual to eyeball the loading dock, the road, and the angle he'd need to cut to pull the back end of the truck to where it needed to go. Just about the time that Bo figured he was going to have to reverse this little train again and hope for the best, Elijah made his move. Forward, back, hauling on the big steering wheel and bringing her around like an ocean freighter fighting the tide.

Bo squeezed around Elijah's front bumper, half on the sidewalk. And then the road behind them was completely blocked by the big truck, with Alice and Molly on the other side. Frantic honking and Bo slowed enough to hear the screeching of tires, to make sure there wasn't a resounding crash afterward. But there wasn't, just Alice's big mouth screaming at Elijah to move. Which ought to slow Elijah down even more. The old fellow didn't handle stress very well.

Luke let out a sigh of relief. "She's good," he said. "And you're lucky that she is, or Cooter would have been chasing after your behind."

"Wouldn't have caught me," Bo informed him. "Not with his car in pieces."

Luke snorted and pointed forward. As if Bo didn't know to drive without the gesture.

A half hour later, they were hiking up to the still site. Where Jesse greeted them with a gruff, "What took you so long?" Standing there in his faded overalls, wiping a red handkerchief across his forehead and studying the progress of his mash that cooked with a wafting odor that burned Bo's nose and smelled like every happy memory of his life.

"Bo there didn't want to lose his girlfriend," Luke explained, got himself punched on the shoulder.

"Well, it's about time," Jesse concluded. "Help me lift the—" and a finger pointing to a burlap sack, because the process of making moonshine was ingrained in them as Dukes, and they didn't need words half the time to tell each other what they needed.

Luke set to working with Jesse, and Bo found himself a halfway comfortable log to sit on. "Y'all let me know when you need me to drive you somewhere."

Luke turned toward him. The soft angular light from the fire glowing orange across Luke's face revealed the sardonic eyebrow raised at him. "Thanks for all your help."

"My hands are hurt, remember?" he answered, holding up his palms so Luke could see the fresh, pink skin there that itched at all the worst moments.

"Funny how they were good enough for you to drive," Luke pointed out, but it was good-natured. Amused.

"I can always drive," Bo informed him. _And_ , he didn't bother to add, _no matter how hurt I am, I will always drive better than you._


	11. Stewing in Sour Juices

**Eleven: Stewing in Sour Juices**

 _July 20, 1974_

By the time Alice got home with Cooter's car, it was closer to eight than Daisy would have liked, but it wasn't as though she could complain. She just took the keys from Alice and slid into the car, explaining how she had to return it to their friend. Molly and Alice offered to accompany her and she thanked them, but waved them off.

It was a good thing that the Barracuda was fast.

On her way to town, she called Cooter on the CB to say she was coming. And to covertly let Jesse, who was tuned to the same channel up at the still site, know that Alice and Molly were safely back at the farm without any means to leave. Unless they wanted to steal the tractor or ride Maudine, either of which would be a fantastically slow way to get anywhere at all.

Because it had always been part of the plan that she'd be the one to bring the car back to town. She'd made sure of it, when Bo was laying out his plan in a rare moment that the four of them had alone together. Mumbling low in the kitchen, with Jesse keeping watch in the arch that opened into the living room. It had been early and while Alice and Molly were notoriously slow about getting to the breakfast table, they also had a sixth sense for the absolute worst moment to enter any room.

"Let Cooter take you boys' pickup back to town," she'd suggested. Because that would tie up all the family cars during the chase and afterward. Jesse would take his pickup to the still site, _Tilly_ would be on the run with Alice and Molly in tow. Daisy would take advantage of being left behind on the farm to pull the coil wire out of Molly's half-lame pickup. If Molly tried to start it up, it would be mysteriously dead. Then, once the coil wire was back in place the next morning, the old truck would be just as mysteriously fine. (Or as fine as it ever had been, anyway.)

Ever since Bo had totaled Luke's Dodge Falcon a couple of years back, the boys had been sharing a pickup truck that they'd dragged out of the junkyard. If Cooter drove home in that after dropping off his car, and then later on Daisy took Cooter's car back to him, there'd be no way for Alice and Molly to leave the farm. Especially if Cooter kept the pickup and Daisy got a ride home from Enos.

"Enos Strate?" Bo had laughed out. "You still hanging out with him, girl?"

"Hush," she'd said, and only partly because Bo had a pitiful grasp of the word _quiet_. He also had a pitiful grasp of what it meant to mind his own business. "And what's wrong with him, anyway?"

"Well, for starts, he's the same Enos Strate who couldn't dribble a basketball to save his life." Which was not terribly important. Sure, back in those childhood games, he would bounce the ball off his own foot as often as the floor. But he had good aim and strong enough arms that the strategy had been to station him under the basket and just get the ball to him. From there, he could usually score on his own.

"He scored more points than you," she pointed out.

"I was shorter then," Bo said, like it explained anything at all. Heck, they'd all been shorter then.

"He's taken up with the law," was Luke's answer, in that low, very serious voice of his. The one that always tried to sound wise and only succeeded about half the time. "And Rosco Coltrane."

"He worked hard for that job! And you always knew he wanted to be a lawman." At least, he used to talk about it when he was young, how he wanted to help people.

"I didn't know you was going to start dating him," Luke replied, and then Jesse had put a stop to it. Had said that he had no objections to Daisy spending time with Enos, because he was a gentleman and she was smart enough to know what not to say to him. Bo had fidgeted like he had more to say on the subject, and it was at that moment that Alice had entered the room.

"I think it's great that Daisy's got a boyfriend," was her uninvited contribution to the subject. "Even if he ain't who you'd expect her to be with. Reckon I wish I had a boyfriend the same as she does."

Which had put a stop to everything right on the spot. Bo had suddenly discovered that he needed to go outside and commune with the goats, and the rest of the family had traded looks. It was settled – Daisy would take Cooter's car back then see Enos, who would bring her home.

What hadn't been discussed was exactly how long Bo would take to lose Alice and Molly in their game of chase. Long enough to let Jesse get to the still site was about the extent of the plan, and she figured forty-five minutes for that, tops. And she didn't figure Bo would want to spend any more time with Alice on his tail than he had to, so she'd told Enos she'd meet him at the library, before it closed at eight.

But, thanks to Bo's laziness (and if it wasn't that, it was deliberate slowness to keep her and Enos apart) she was going to be late and she hated that. Never got in trouble for tardiness in school, never made a friend wait for her to join in an after school shopping trip, either. Whereas Bo was always late everywhere he went, and everyone knew it, too. Said for a boy who could drive faster than the wind, he sure did have a bad habit of taking his time getting wherever he was going. Luke wasn't much better, and Jesse had been raised on country time, which was loosely meant to be understood that he'd get where he was going, eventually.

And maybe it was her family's reputation that made it so hard for her to find a job. Who'd want to hire a Duke, when they were known to be late all the time?

Turning onto Hazzard Square, she screeched the Barracuda's tires without even meaning to. Brought the car to an equally noisy stop in front to the Hazzard Garage, which was where she'd agreed to leave it. Waved across the nearly dark lot to Cooter, who was on the far side of the gas pumps with a couple of guys that she didn't know, but Cooter's father always hired in temporary workers in the busy summer months. This year's temporary help seemed to be a lanky pair that were sitting in old chairs around an empty oil drum, playing cards with Cooter. She just hoped the bunch of them weren't drinking. If they were, Cooter would lose for sure.

She crossed under the streetlight and over to Church Street, her clogs clacking noisily on the road as she went. The library was dark except for a few lights in the back, which meant it was closed and she might just need to turn around and prevail upon Cooter to give up the game and bring her home, but then, there was Enos. Sitting on the front steps of the library, next to those columns, and it was perfect and stupid all at once. Their usual dating grounds.

He stood and greeted her with a smile, and took both her hands in his. Sat down on the cool of the concrete steps with her and asked how her job search was going and listened to her complain about her lack of success. Then he regaled her with tales of studying all the wanted posters and doing endless KP, until one day he found an old bicycle in one of the storage rooms of the sheriff's station. He'd talked the sheriff into letting him use it to patrol town, which was how he found the widow Larkin's fitted sheet hanging from the Stevensons' tree (a victim of high winds), and helped Mr. Hopkins locate his wandering rooster. Then there was little Mary Percival's cat that he rescued from the maple tree in her backyard. He showed Daisy the souvenir scratches on his arms and she scolded him for not calling her right away so she could come take care of them for him. (Except the only disinfectant her family had ever used was moonshine. And what was it Jesse had said? That she was smart enough to know what not to say to Enos.)

"They're all right, Daisy. Mrs. Percival made sure they got washed out real good with soap and water."

"You still should have called me." If only to keep some other woman from touching Enos in places that Daisy hadn't even figured out how to get him to let her touch.

"I'm sure you would have taken real good care of them," he conceded.

There was no moon. Even if there had been, the sky was thick with clouds. No way to see the stars and no crickets or cicadas in concrete-covered town to sing. No clear way to tell the time, but she would have sworn it was only minutes before Enos was saying he ought to take her home now, since he had to be up early to take the Sunday morning shift. As the new guy, he didn't get to sleep late or go to church.

They walked the short distance to the boarding house where Enos was living, and got into his father's car. The same one she'd first seen him in again back in June, and must have been on long term loan to him. June seemed so long ago now. Like she was a little girl then and had become a woman now.

The drive was thick with shadows and silence. She scrambled for anything at all to talk about, but the closeness of the car made all her thoughts scatter. Funny, she could sit elbow to elbow with him on the library steps and chatter away, put a car around her and—

Maybe it was that she'd been on dates in cars before, and she knew how they ended. Steering wheels and stick shifts were mighty inconvenient when you were a teenager on a date at the Kissing Cliff pull off and boys figured you were wild and easy. But Enos wasn't like that. Didn't try to crawl into her lap or get her to crawl into his. Had been content with small gestures and little touches and she didn't know what she'd do if he changed it up tonight. If his hands started to roam or his tongue tried to make its way into her mouth. Enos was from the wrong side of the briar patch, too, though maybe not quite so notably as the Dukes were. He could turn out to be just as dangerous as any other boy she'd been with, pushing too hard or too far, and if he did, it would ruin everything.

Which was why there was no explaining how disappointed she was when he pulled the car to a careful stop in her farmyard, got out and opened her door for her, walked her up to her porch and kissed her on the cheek.

"Good night, Daisy," was all he said and then he was jogging back to his car.

Well. She was going to have to do something about his gentlemanly ways.

* * *

It was the light drizzle that woke him. Or maybe it was Luke kicking his feet, all accidental-like.

"What?" he mumbled before he was even sure he was awake. He hadn't meant to fall asleep for real. He'd intended to keep watch, to make sure that they were safe because last time Luke and Jesse were up here brewing moonshine, his cousin had spent the night chasing sounds.

Not tonight, apparently. Luke was snorting at him.

"Well, hello there," Jesse said from over by the fire that he was stoking. "Welcome back."

Very funny.

"Everything all right?" he asked. Rubbed his knuckles over his eyes and tried to figure out the time. Too dark to see whether the rain would get worse or better, but he could feel the closeness of the clouds, like a tent around them. Damp earth and moonshine mash – the smells of everything that had raised him. The night felt safe.

"Everything's fine," Luke informed him. He was over there watching the moonshine drip slowly out of the copper coil into a vat. The Dukes' coil, called a worm, was more interesting than most, having been bent and twisted and banged around so much that it was lopsided. Slow process, and Bo usually got bored before too long. But Luke always had taken to cooking better than he did. "Except for some fool on his back, resting his head on a log and snoring loud enough to put the bears to shame."

Yeah, a log made for a lousy pillow. He got his elbows under him and shoved himself up to something closer to sitting. Still leaning on the log, though.

"You'd be tired too, if you hadn't been napping the whole time I was driving circles around Alice." The look Luke gave him over that crooked worm called him a liar – whether it disputed the claim that Luke was napping or that Bo was driving circles around Alice wasn't clear. (Though he'd have to admit that both were technically lies.) "Jesse, I don't know why you ain't just sent her and Molly back to the swamp. I don't reckon she and Alice are really scared of nothing there. Shoot, I reckon most of what lives in the swamp is scared of them. If I was a gator and saw Alice coming, I'd—"

"Bo," Jesse warned, real quiet. Serious as a whipped hind end.

"Well I would," Bo mumbled under his breath. "Besides," he added, louder. "How do we know it ain't them that's been causing us so much trouble? Don't you figure it's a mite strange that they would show up right after our barn—"

"Bo." That warning came a little louder, and the long stick that Jesse had been using to poke at the fire got jabbed in his general direction. "You mind your manners. Molly and Alice might be a bubble or two off plumb, but they're friends. And they wouldn't hurt us none."

"How exactly did she save you back in the fall of '36 anyway?" Luke asked, pulling himself away from his careful study of the distillation process to walk around to where Bo was. "And why do you figure you owe her bad enough that you're letting her stay with us? I mean, look at what we had to go through tonight just to cook up a batch." Luke offered a hand down, and Bo grabbed his wrist. Pulled himself to his feet and set to dusting off his jeans. Luke smacked him on the arm for it, grabbed Bo by the wrists and looked at his hands. Tsked and pointed him to the stream to wash off the dust.

"What we had to go through tonight?" Jesse countered. Dropped his stick and started fishing through his overall pockets. From the tone of his voice, it sounded like maybe he'd taken to keeping the world's smallest whip in there and was getting ready to tan their hides. "I don't reckon it was too hard on you boys to go joyriding around the county while I come up here and got started, was it?"

Well, no.

"That ain't the point," Luke informed him. "The point is—"

It was right about then that Jesse produced a handkerchief from his pocket and dabbed at his forehead with near-violence.

"The point is, she and Alice need a place to stay for a while and there ain't no good reason it can't be with us. Now, just say 'yes, sir'," he warned, width of his fist closing tight around the handkerchief with the index pointing at one of them then the other, "and drop it."

"Yes, sir," Bo echoed. Luke mumbled something, which might or might not have been the prescribed words. Which left them at an uncomfortable impasse. Jesse quit pointing at them and put his handkerchief back into the pocket from which it had come. Bo made his way over to the stream to wash his hands before Luke started in on him.

"I don't really figure it was Molly that burned our barn anyway," Luke said, folding his arms across his chest. Which didn't do anything to improve the way Jesse was glowering at them. "I reckon it was J.D. Hogg. Now hear me out, Jesse," he added right quick, when the oldster took a step toward him. Orange glow of the fire lighting up one side of Jesse's face, leaving all kinds of angry shadows in its wake. "Who's so all-fired eager to buy our land? And how better to try to make us sell quick and cheap than to start making things real uncomfortable for us? And then sending Rosco out to investigate, like that man has half the brains it would take to— Anyway. I figure it's J.D. Hogg."

For a minute – a whole minute, which was far too long a time for his uncle to look quite that angry – Jesse glowered. At Luke, at him, at the whole situation. Leaving them to stew in their own juices, and they weren't good juices. Sour, a little bitter.

And then the look passed and all that was left was wrinkles. And that shock of hair that had gone mostly white in just those few years when Luke was in the service. Old, far older than he'd ever looked before, and Bo didn't like it. He came away from the stream, hands still dripping, to stand at Luke's side.

"Reckon it's time you two made your delivery. I got this under control."

"Uncle Jesse," Bo tried, because he didn't like leaving on bad terms.

"No, you young'uns just go. We all got to be home in time for breakfast tomorrow or I reckon Molly and them will find a way to come looking for us. And you're right, they're the competition. So just git."

"Yes, sir," one or the other of them said, and they loaded up a couple of burlap sacks with the jugs and jars of moonshine that Jesse had run last week. Old rags set between the bottles inside the bags so they wouldn't smack into each other and break, and then they were lifting their burdens. Staggering slightly as they started on their careful and near-silent journey back the half-mile to where they'd left Tilly, Luke carrying more than his fair share.

Jesse stayed back to finish today's batch, which would need to be bottled and cooled and left to sit for a while before it was ready for delivery. The boys could hear him mumbling things about whippersnappers that were wet behind the ears and figured it was okay to shoot their mouths off all the same.

"It's your fault," he whispered to Luke. Got a snort for an answer.

* * *

 _July 22, 1974_

"That cousin of yours, he's something, ain't he?" It was only two-thirty in the afternoon, and already Cooter smelled of whiskey. Had a soda can in his hand, but it probably contained more than Coke. Standing with Luke on the oil-stained pavement in front of his father's garage, and it was no wonder he hadn't inherited the garage yet. Then again, if Cooter's father was waiting for him to grow up enough to be responsible for the business, well, he might be waiting until the day he died.

"We ain't been able to get off the farm a whole lot," Luke said to explain the way Bo was leaning against the whitewashed railing on the stairs to the gazebo in the middle of Hazzard Square, with a small posse of girls vying for his attention. "Reckon they missed him as much as he missed them."

"Reckon so," Cooter agreed, taking a deep drink of whatever was in that can. Luke would suggest he slow down, except that kind of advice had never worked before. "I understand y'all did manage to get away from your houseguests the other night, though."

"Yeah," Luke said. Hopped himself up to sit on the trunk of the oversized blue Impala that was taking up far too much space in the lot. Cooter's practical, everyday car, when he wasn't driving the Barracuda. That was the benefit of coming from a line of mechanics. Easy access to cars and Cooter had already been through more than his fair share. "Thanks for that."

"No problemo, buddy-roe. How'd y'all get away today?" Cooter hoisted himself up to sit heavily next to Luke.

It had been easier than he would have guessed, honestly. He and Bo had announced that they were headed to the dump in Jesse's pickup to get rid of all the rubble from the barn. Must not have sounded like much of anything appealing to Molly and Alice. Especially since they left out the part where when they were done at the dump, they'd head to the general store town to arrange the delivery of fresh lumber and get a boatload of hardware and rope and paint. And tools, because most of theirs had been melted into a molten lump. Everything they'd need to build a new barn, because now that they'd made a successful delivery, they could afford to start rebuilding. Granted, they'd be eating a lot of beans instead of beef, but it'd be worth it just to get the livestock back into their own space. And get the hounds back from Wilsons so they could hunt themselves some venison.

"Told 'em we'd be visiting you," Luke said, knocking his shoulder against his friend's. Enjoying a chance to relax for the first time in what felt like a month. He and Bo really ought to be heading home, but he had to admit that he wasn't in any real hurry. "They said you was a no-account drunken fool and they didn't want to spend no time with you."

"I always did like that Molly." Cooter's grin wasn't nearly as pretty as Bo's, especially not with the smudges of oil on his face here and there. But it was cute all the same, and that gap in his teeth on the one side gave him a boyish charm. "You don't really figure it was her set your barn on fire, do you?"

"Bo thinks that," and apparently had imparted that information to their friend when he borrowed the car a couple of days ago. Luke would have to remind his cousin that Cooter was trustworthy, so long as he was sober. Most of the time when he wasn't, too, but sometimes his mouth got to rambling after too much liquor had been poured into it. Best to be careful throwing around unproven theories with him. "Me, I got my own suspicions."

"Your suspicions wouldn't happen to have a round belly and wear white?" Then again, it wasn't like keeping things from Cooter ever really worked anyway. The man had grown up alongside them knowing all the same people and seeing all the same injustices.

"Most of the time," Luke mused. J.D. Hogg had been known to wear a bit of black from time to time. At funerals only. "He wants the farm, for some reason. I reckon he just wants us out of business."

"Funny thing about your man in white," Cooter said, knocking his elbow, then pointing to the old wooden chairs by the garage door. They'd been there for years and seen better days, but when the mechanic business was slow, Cooter and his father would sit in them and watch the cars pass on Hazzard Square. "I was sitting there the other day with Kevin—"

"Kevin?" It was one thing for Cooter to know Duke business and another for some stranger to be involved.

"One of them boys been working here this summer. Him and his brother Jeremy. You met 'em." Maybe he had, but if so it had been in passing. Like at the Boar's Nest or something. "Anyway, we was sitting over in them chairs, playing a round of rummy, and old J.D. Hogg comes walking by. Says how-de-do and he just knows a fine citizen like me will vote for him. Kind of frowns when he finds out that Kevin is from over in Placid and can't vote here."

"Yeah?" Luke said, his eyes tracking back over to Bo. Somewhere in those years when Luke had been in the service, Bo had gone from a silly kid with big feet, skinned knees and messy hair who wasn't entirely sure that girls didn't have cooties, to a young man that could attract the fillies like bees to a hive. Luke ought to know – he had a certain amount of nectar in him, too.

"Yeah, and funny thing if, after he left here, he didn't walk right over to the library."

"Sounds hilarious," Luke agreed. "You follow him?" Because that was Cooter's way. Curiosity may have killed the cat, but Cooter had proven to have more than nine lives. He'd tiptoe anywhere, after almost anyone. Every now and then he came upon the business end of a shotgun. But he was a fast talker and pretty much known to everyone in the county, so he rarely came away from his adventures with more than a bruise or two.

"You know, I did that very thing. And guess where he went?"

Luke kept on watching Bo flash those teeth and shake all that blond hair, thinking about younger days. When it was him in the middle of the girls and Jesse was the one who worried about bigger things. Like which friends you could trust and which you had to look out for. He hummed a little _mm?_ to keep Cooter talking.

"The archives section in the back."

Now that was a surprise. "What business would he have back there?" Ever since the county had been all but bankrupted by mismanagement, the library staff had been cut to nearly nothing. The records section was closed almost all the time. It took a special appointment with Alma Hixson to get to look at anything interesting.

"I had that very same question," Cooter explained, and it was then that Luke realized that this was going to be one of his friend's winding tales. The kind that didn't sound like much at first, but the more that got told, the more they roped you in. "So I wander on into the reference section and make like I'm looking up information on some fancy foreign car. Not that anybody asked me what I was doing in there." No, people that didn't know him well tended to avoid Cooter. He was loud and dirty, both of which were off-putting to your average librarian. "I stay until he leaves. I make sure I'm mumbling something that sounded real official-like as he goes past me, like 'carburetor float valve for an Alfa Romeo.'"

Across the square, Bo was holding out his hands, showing the girls his battle scars from the night of the fire. Getting lots of attention and probably offers of live-in nursing, too.

"Yeah? What then?"

"Well, he left the library and I see him go on over to the tax assessor's office in the county building." Cooter's hand was in the air, his fingers walking in that general direction. "Then I head on down to Alma in archives. Now Alma, she's sweet on me." She was also closing in on seventy, so Cooter's virtue was safe from her. "So I didn't have to beat around no bush. I just asked her what old J.D. was looking up." Cooter bumped his shoulder to make sure Luke was listening closely. This here was the punch line. "She says, he's trying to track down the records on a bunch of parcels on Bald Hill. Like who owns them and for how long, and suchlike. Can you imagine? Bald Hill?"

Mission accomplished; Cooter had his full attention. "What does he want with Bald Hill?" Luke snapped.

"Don't know," Cooter said, cheerful as ever, like he hadn't just been barked at. "Ain't nothing up there but a bunch of trees and some of the thickest growth of poison ivy I ever saw." Yeah, well. Those things just happened to be an excellent disguise for a copper still with a crooked copper worm. The north slope of Bald Hill was where Lavinia's ancestors had once built a cabin. There wasn't anything left now but a foundation, and that foundation was the perfect size, shape and location to house the Dukes' still. "But I figured maybe you'd know. He's always trying to build some kind of condominiums or some—"

"Hey, Bo!" Luke had already stopped listening to Cooter somewhere in there, anyway. Gotten to his feet and started trying to catch Bo's eye. "Come on!" It was time the two of them got going. They needed to have another conversation with their uncle about one Jefferson Davis Hogg.

Bo took leave of the girls with a grin and promises so big and bold that Luke knew what they were without even hearing them.

"What do _you_ figure he wants that land for," Cooter asked, while they both watched Bo trot across the green toward the garage.

"Don't know," Luke said, and he could feel the tension in his own jaw. The mean look in his eye, the clenching of his fists. "But I aim to find out."


	12. Wrong as Wrong Could Be

_**Author's Note:** As some of y'all probably already know, research is my friend. I do far too much of it, often as a means of procrastinating on the writing. I once learned whole volumes about Holsteins - and then ended up writing one non-committal sentence about "livestock." So yeah, I have a research problem._

 _Years ago, when writing_ Running _, I very carefully picked out which cars the Dukes and their friends would have owned in the late 60s/early 70s. I googled around and even saved images for myself, so I wouldn't forget what they each looked like. I also went back and looked at the original_ Sweet Tilly _in_ High Octane _to see what she was. Turned out she was a Ford, so I figured the Dukes were not strictly loyal to Dodges and it was safe to give Luke a Ford Falcon.  
_

 _Fast forward to now, when I decided to be lazy and give Luke the same car he'd had in_ Running. _Except I was entirely too lazy and didn't look it up again to see what it looked like or what make it was._

 _Which is how Luke came to have once owned a Dodge Falcon in this story, even if no such car ever existed. I have a really awesome excuse though. It goes like this:_

 _Oops._

 _Yeah, it didn't work for Rick Perry, either._

 _Thanks to everyone for reading, and special thanks to HazzardHusker for reading so carefully as to note my car make/model challenges. (Maybe I need to employ you as my beta all over again.) Enough of my blah-blah-blah and back to the story.  
_

* * *

 **Twelve: Wrong as Wrong Could Be**

 _July 23, 1974_

He had better things to do. Other things to be minding, and he kept telling himself that. Should be chasing speeders in town, catching spray-painting vandals making a mess of railroad cars at the depot, maybe training that new boy, Enos Strate. But no one had complained to him about nearly getting run over when crossing Hazzard Square, and the smell of paint fumes seemed to make the railroad workers cheerful enough. Furthermore, the sheriff's station was cleaner than it had been since 1952 or so, which was probably the last time there was a young, eager deputy willing to do whatever it took to ensure himself a job. Plus, Enos had dug out that bicycle from the basement somewhere. Rusty as a nail left out in a month's worth of rain, with big fenders and a crumbling wicker basket on the front. It seemed to suit the fool well enough to ride it around town in his uniform and offer his services to anyone and everyone.

Enos would patiently wait to be trained as long as Rosco wanted him to.

Still. Where he belonged was not where he was, and where he was wasn't getting him anywhere at all. On patrol, at least that was the official story in his log book. And in his head, but his head also knew that he was patrolling only one small sector of his county. Doing loops and laps around one particular farm far from the center of town.

And, oh damn, he was patrolling in the wrong place. Wrong as wrong could be when the cloud of dust raised up out of nothing on Sawmill Lane, coming toward him. Building on itself, then parting to reveal white. A Cadillac convertible, and there was no place to hide. No tree or bush big enough to conceal a cruiser (and occupant) and besides, a sheriff shouldn't be hiding. He should be out in the open and people should be hiding from him! He was, after all, the ultimate authority in these parts.

And yet, it was funny how the low car pulling up to parallel his, with a driver that was almost more hat than person, could make him feel like a scared little boy.

"Why, hello there, sheriff," was a friendly enough greeting. The puff of cigar smoke that made it in through Rosco's open window was less friendly. "I trust that your mother and sister are well," was even less friendly than that. A threat? What cause did Jefferson Davis Hogg have to speak of his mother or sister if he wasn't planning to raise their rent beyond the point where Rosco could pay it?

"Just get to the point, Hogg," he blurted. Which wasn't smart, oh, so not smart. But his tongue didn't always listen to his brain and his brain didn't always listen to his good sense. Which he didn't always have in the first place.

"What are you doing over in these parts?" The grin on the man's face was as fat as his belly and as greasy as his hair. He wasn't going to get to the point, he was going to sit there in the driver's seat and squash Rosco like a little bug. Either that or just straight out asphyxiate him. Between the cigar and the exhaust from that fancy car, there wasn't a morsel of clean air to breathe. "You wouldn't happen to be about to go by the Duke farm, would you?"

This was what came of being in the wrong place at the wrong time. (Or the wrong place all the time.) There were other places he should be, things he could be doing. If he hadn't gotten preoccupied by Jesse and Molly and Alice and Bo and Luke and Daisy. All of them cohabitating, and why? What were they up to?

And what did it matter, when he'd been pinned down by an utterly gleeful Hogg. Almost disgustingly solicitous and Rosco figured this was what it was like to be a juicy steak at the Boar's Nest. To be looked at in lip-licking approval for all of a second before being utterly devoured.

"Reckon I'll pass by there," he admitted. Because it was only obvious. There wasn't much of anything else out this way, and besides, J.D. had known exactly where to find him. The question wasn't so much a question as gloating. I-told-you-there-was-something-fishy-about-those-Dukes. "Shortly." As soon as he could get away, but Hogg looked like he was perfectly comfortable where he was. And his fuel tank was probably twice the size of Rosco's to begin with, not to mention that he had actual money to fill it as often as he liked. Rosco was already on a quarter of a tank and the rumble under the seat of his pants reminded him that he was wasting gas with every second he sat here.

"Well, you just do that," J.D. simpered. "And when you do, you just ask yourself whether Jesse Duke didn't deliberately burn down his own barn."

What-what—"What?" Why on earth would he—accidentally while brewing up moonshine, sure. But on purpose? Why—"Why would he do that?" Rosco pulled off his hat, ran a hand through his sweaty hair. And that right there was another reason he needed to be moving. July's heat was too brutal to sit still in a steaming car with no air and no fan to speak of.

"To hide something, maybe?"

Well, sure, if he was that sort. But Jesse Duke was pretty upfront. Aside from his secretive business, that was. "What would he have to hide? He ain't got much of nothing to begin with." Nobody in Hazzard did. With the exception of the man in the fancy automobile, smirking at him. Like he was waiting for Rosco to catch on to his brilliance, but there wasn't anything at all to catch onto. Not with a man as slippery as Hogg. "Besides, he ain't the sort of man to destroy nothing. Not on purpose." His nephews, they might be a different story.

"Dat," and a sour face, evidently meant Rosco had a point. J.D. flicked the ash from his cigar on the ground distastefully. "All right, his nephews, then. Maybe they burned it. Maybe to hide some information. Like secret deeds to land they don't rightly have a claim on. Ain't you the one that said them boys have been a pain in your side since they were itty-bitty?"

Yeah, he'd said something like that.

"I reckon you'd best investigate that there fire," J.D. recommended in that tone that wasn't anything as gentle as a recommendation after all.

"I'm investigating it. I've been investigating it," he swore, squaring his shoulders and plopping his hat on his head. Even if, up until now, he'd been swearing with every fiber in his being that he was _not_ investigating it.

"Well, then," Hogg said, all full of sugar again. "You just have a nice day, sheriff. And let me know how that little investigation turns out."

Sure he would, even if what he'd like to do was turn Hogg out. All the way out of his life.

* * *

 _July 24, 1974_

Luke's hair was blue. At least from where Bo was sitting.

Someone had put a colored filter on a couple of the lights above what was almost jokingly referred to as a stage at the Boar's Nest. Must have been one of the musicians, because J.D. Hogg would never spend money on that sort of thing. Wouldn't see the point, because he had no concept of atmosphere. Probably figured as long as he served something that was vaguely alcoholic in nature, people would show up at the Boar's Nest anyway, being as it was their only real choice for entertainment in the county. (He was just about right about that, too.)

Still, the colored light was both nice and weird, since it was turning Luke blue up there on the stage. Contrasting all those white lights reflecting in the shiny face of his guitar and Bo would swear that Luke made a point to keep tipping it to the angle that would send a blinding ray right back into the audience's eyes. Or Bo's in particular.

Funny to see him up there, playing rhythm guitar and singing lead on that song from a few years back, "Polk Salad Annie." Luke, who was usually so restrained, up in front of all their friends and neighbors, bouncing and swaying to the beat, foot coming off the floor like he almost had it in his head to dance. Grinning and singing mostly out of the right side of his mouth, growling, "Chomp, chomp" on behalf of a granny-eating gator.

Even funnier that he was up there at all. That afternoon, when Daisy first passed on the phone message that the Boar's Nest house band needed a singer and guitarist, since Dan had broken a finger at the mill the day before, Luke had demurred. Had said the Dukes had more important things to worry about than spending a night entertaining in a bar. But then he'd warmed to the idea. Called Charlie, who played bass and made sure the band had a full complement of players on any given Wednesday, and said he was up for it. Had spent a few minutes alone in the kitchen with Jesse, telling him his plans. (Probably getting the usual wasted lecture about being a gentleman with the girls.) Then he'd hollered, "Let's go, Bo," and they were off.

And now all the girls in the audience, the ones Luke was supposed to act gentlemanly toward, stood ready to go anywhere and do anything at all with him. Everywhere, the cooed whispers admired his voice and the blue of his eyes, and some of the more brazen (or maybe just the ones that lacked manners) girls were making comments about the tightness of his jeans and the hind end underneath. Which was a just plain strange thing to be overhearing when Bo had shared a room with the guy almost his whole life and he had never noticed anything in the least interesting about his backside.

Smell of sweat and beer, hot and not enough air in the place to breathe, and another round of drinks for the band ended up on the shin-high platform of a stage. Right in front of Luke, of course, because they'd been bought for him by the girls that were old enough. Luke winking at all of them and none of them, finishing the song about poor Annie and her gator-bitten granny. Bending down and scooping up a beer, meeting with the rest of the band members doing the same. Someone brought one back to David on the drums, and the band polished them off in a few gulps. Then the sticks were clicking together to count off, Luke bobbing his whole body to the beat and the room was full of music again. Bouncing and swaying, Luke oblivious to how silly he looked. (Of course he was oblivious. He had all the girls' giddy attention, which was all he cared about.) Offering up a silly grin when he forgot some lyrics and no one noticed anything at all was amiss. Just more mumblings about didn't that Luke Duke have a nice smile? And such pretty eyes…

Then another pause between songs while Louie, the lead guitarist and the county's best picker, switched to acoustic. Began a complicated intro and the band settled. Capo off the neck of Luke's guitar, changing keys. No more bouncing or swaying, just soft beat and intricate intro. Then Luke, blue halo through his hair and sweat-shiny face, approaching the microphone.

"Desperado," he sang, a little deeper and with more gravel than Don Henley ever had. "Why don't you come to your senses." An _ooh_ went up through the audience and Bo would swear the whole room swooned all at once, even the guys. Bo just ate another too-salty pretzel and shook his head. It was funny how being on a stage made a plain guy seem awfully attractive. Now, get someone like Bo up there, and the girls would faint.

After Luke crooned out those last few words about the poor desperado needing to let somebody love him before it was too late, the band announced they were taking a break. The crowd, half deafened from the too-loud speakers, started shouting conversation at each other and Bo would swear that half the girls in the place wandered off to the bathroom all at once. Luke grabbed another beer from the fresh tray that had been set on the platform in front of him, and stepped down into the room. Accepted kisses on his cheek and pats on his back, stopped to say howdy to Cooter and his friends in the row of chairs up front. Then he wound his way back into the tables and made a beeline for Bo.

"Here," he said, handing off his guitar. Slippery with Luke's sweat, warm to the touch. The strap was heavy and slick, and Luke at least had the decency to wipe the pick off on his jeans before handing it over. "You play the next set."

Bo almost dropped the guitar. Held on by sheer force of will and a powerful desire not to embarrass himself or otherwise do anything that would make Luke rescind the offer. "Really?" he said and almost kicked himself for that, too. But the offer had never been made for him to play with the band before. He was just Luke's kid cousin.

"Yeah," Luke said. "Sure, why not? You know all the same songs I do. Just don't you drink none of them beers they're going to offer you. Not here." Because he was still a couple weeks off from eighteen and while Luke wasn't a stickler about him being of age in private, they were right in the middle of the Boar's Nest now. J.D. Hogg might not be anywhere to be found (and was pretty much guaranteed not to be here on a night with a live band that played music that set his teeth on edge), but if word got back to him that Bo had been drinking underage, odds were he'd have Sheriff Rosco arrest him again. "Unless your hands are still too sore," came the grinning goad.

"Don't worry," Bo assured him. "I can handle the pain." Heard the symbols smack together on the drum kit, which meant they'd be going up there on the stage again soon.

"Bet you can. The pain of all them girls batting their eyelashes at you. And Bo," Luke said to him before he could start to make his way through the crowd and up to the stage. "Make sure you keep everyone's attention. Sing real pretty."

Oh, that'd be no problem at all. If there was one thing he was and always had been, it was prettier – in all ways – than Luke.

* * *

All it took was one shake of that blond halo of curls, the awkward way Bo held the guitar up – because Luke' strap was a bit short for him and maybe his hands _were_ still a little tender – and that smile. It made everyone in the room think of sunshine.

A few words between the players, the screech and snarl of the microphone as Bo raised the stand from Luke's height to his own (but no one had asked him to grow so tall in the first place), and then they were off again, playing at breakneck speed. Bo singing with all the sincerity in the world that his love was warmer than the warmest sunshine and softer than a sigh, deeper than the deepest ocean and wider than the sky, and he had them eating out of the palm of his hand. Sweet as candy, but who didn't love candy?

Luke left him to it. Headed to the bathroom first, because he'd had plenty of beer in the hot lights of the stage. Was glad to find the echoing space empty (and comparatively cool – someone had cracked a window). Scrubbed his hands and splashed his face, ran his fingers through his sweaty hair, but there was no hope for that mess. Tucked in his shirt tails – _quit stalling_ – and he headed back out into the bar.

Bo's love was still bigger and brighter and better than anything in the world, so no one noticed that Luke Duke didn't bother to get himself a beer or take a seat. Or that he kept right on moving along the side wall, sticking to the shadows and slipping along about half the length of the room, to the one dark and recessed door. Turned the knob, or tried, pushed his weight against it but it didn't do anything more than shudder.

Luke's eyes cut carefully around the crowd to see if they had heard anything, but their backlit faces were all turned toward the stage. As long as Bo was up there with his pretty grin and his gleeful voice, nobody noticed or cared about what Luke Duke was up to. (He'd resent it, if only it weren't so predictable. And useful.)

He slid his bolo knife out from its pouch at his hip – about a quarter the size of the Ka-Bar he used to carry in the Corps, but it would suffice under the current circumstances – and slipped the blade into the small space between the door and frame. Easy to press the sharp tip into the sweet spot until it clicked, then swing the door inward. Hazzard County security always did leave a little something to be desired.

He looked around the roadhouse once more to find no one paying him any mind at all, then stepped inside the door he just opened then closed it behind him. Sheathed his knife and started feeling around the wall for a light switch, because it was pitch black in this windowless, cigar- reeking space.

Jefferson Davis Hogg's office. Good thing the man was plenty predictable as far as his habits went. Eating too much and when he wasn't doing that, he'd have one of those choking cigars in his mouth. And if neither was a possibility, he'd go after his own nails, but that wasn't why Luke had agreed to fill in with the band tonight, and why he knew he'd be safe in this office now.

J.D.'s other habit – sliding out of his own establishment on Wednesday nights and blaming it on the live band, that was what Luke had counted on. Most likely, old J.D. was off somewhere dark and secretive with Lulu Coltrane right about now. Everyone but Rosco could see how he waggled his caterpillar eyebrows at her during Sunday sermons, and how she might-near got the vapors in return. Swaying in her seat like a frail schoolgirl, pursing her lips like she could kiss him when he was on the far side of the aisle from her. Luke hoped the secretly courting couple was seeing a movie or something, anything that would keep the fat man out of his own lair for a while yet to come.

Cooler in here, the music was muffled but plenty loud enough to hear Bo ad-libbing and tossing the names of girls into the lyrics where they didn't rightly belong. (And getting little shrieks here and there as rewards for his efforts.) And, once he found the switch to the overhead light, it was a good bit brighter, too. Luke blinked a bunch of times to clear his vision.

Dissonant sounds from the other side of the wall as the band finished one song and clearly couldn't agree on what key to use for the next. Then it settled into that almost painfully sweet love song from a few years back, "Honey." Leave it to Bo to pick something like that to sing.

Didn't know what he was looking for, but Luke figured that this being J.D. Hogg's office, there would be plenty to find anyway. Tried the closet first, but there wasn't anything in there but a series of white suit coats and pants, most of which were probably too small for the man now. Moved on to the credenza, where there was a supply of candy and another of cigars, the odd silver trinket and plenty of dirty dishes, like the man couldn't be bothered to bring them back to the kitchen all of thirty yards away. The desk was more of the same, wrinkled papers and a fork so crusted over with something unrecognizable that it looked like it had grown fur.

This mission seemed just about pointless. The same as yesterday's visit to the library had been. He went looking for Alma, but found only a sour librarian who said if he wanted access to the records, he'd have to make an appointment. Asked him his name and he'd excused himself rather than give it and leave a trail behind him. If J.D. knew he was snooping around, well, he'd get better at covering his tracks. It was much easier to follow a man that thought he was far too clever to be followed.

The song was winding down – Bo warbling about his lost love, and the girls had to be hanging onto his every word. Promising him with their eyes (and their jutted chests, no doubt) that they would love him forever and never leave him, if only he'd give them a second look. (Oh, he was a Duke. He was giving them third and fourth looks.)

Luke was about to give up when he came upon a ragged piece of notebook paper left sitting on the corner of the pool table that Hogg had hauled out of the bar area and into here when he took over the place. Paper didn't look like much, just some squiggles and lines and odd shaped ovals here and there. He would have figured it was some kid's drawing – never mind that J.D. Hogg had no kids and didn't even like to be near them – except for the three words written towards the middle: Old Mill Road. It was a map. Badly drawn and not even clear in what its purpose was supposed to be, but the Duke Farm was the only property that fronted on Old Mill Road. He flipped the paper over to find another set of crudely-drawn curves and lines. Parcels marked out, and Luke might have been mistaken, but he thought Bald Hill might have been near the center of it. Marks here and there and none of them anywhere near Lavinia's land in general or Jesse's still site in specific. That was good, meant Hogg was fishing but not reeling anything in—

Was that a click? Hard to hear over the sound of the band finishing their song and the cheers of the overwrought girls. Mostly he could hear the cymbals crash one last time and—

Yes, definitely a click, a rattle. A key being put into a lock. Luke was already moving, dropping the paper wherever it fell, trying to think. What and where and—

It was the back door, the one from the parking lot into the far end of the office. Luke took two loping steps toward the other door, the one that led back into the bar. Heard the opening chords of the next song and hoped like hell that Bo had every eye in the joint fixed on him, because there was no time to listen for footsteps or peek through a crack or even pretend to exit stealthily. He just opened the door and stepped through to the other side. Closed it and it was only then that he realized he'd left the light on back there. Oh, well, nothing to do about that now.

He stayed to the edge of the room in the shadows. Waiting for his heart to stop trying to bounce out through his ears, for his mouth to have saliva in it again, trying to breathe normally.

The door to the office flew open in a rush, the light spilling into the bar, and then Hogg was there next to him.

"Leave it to a Duke," he hollered over the intro to whatever the next song was going to be. Luke didn't have enough wits to figure out the sequence of chords. "To be right in the middle of the way when I'm trying to get to the kitchen of my own establishment."

Must have been a bad date with Lulu Coltrane, then. Short, and he was cranky. Hungry, too, but that didn't prove anything at all. Like Bo, he was probably born hungry and hadn't been full a day since. All the same, he was sufficiently preoccupied with his misery that he hadn't noticed anything amiss in his office. Or just hadn't thought about it yet.

"Sorry, Mr. Hogg," Luke said. Got a raised eyebrow for his politeness. Yeah, it had to be nerves that made Luke say that instead of something more appropriately snide.

"And another one up there on the stage, making that infernal noise. Reckon they'd best be done by the time I get back here with my dinner. And you and your cousin best be gone by then, too."

 _Yes, sir_. J.D. headed off to make the kitchen staff's lives hell, mumbling something about no-account Dukes. Luke started making his way through the crowd to break up the music, grab Bo, and get the heck out of there faster than hog jowls could be slapped on a plate.


	13. Penny for Your Thoughts

**Thirteen: Penny for Your Thoughts**

 _July 25, 1974_

The problem wasn't the movie, exactly. That much had been fine. In fact, Daisy was rather a fan of Paul Newman, though it wouldn't be smart to go mentioning that to her date.

Her date, and that was the important thing. She kept reminding herself of that, how she really was enjoying being on a real, honest-to-goodness date. Out with other people in a public place instead of some old library steps. Being picked up at her own house, Enos coming in and making small talk with Jesse and Molly, Alice and the boys. Waiting while she pretended that she still needed to put on makeup when she'd actually been ready an hour early (but it wouldn't do to let a man know that), then escorting her all gentlemanly to his father's car. Opening the door and making sure she didn't knock her head on the way in (which probably had more to do with being a deputy than being chivalrous), driving to town slow and gentle. Talking about his day of mopping and scrubbing and patrolling Hazzard Square on foot. How he'd helped Miz Tisdale across the street even if she said she didn't need him to and—

The problem wasn't the movie. It wasn't the first time she'd seen it, either. _Butch Cassidy and the Sundance Kid_ – she'd seen it with Bo some years back. Movies in Hazzard were never first run, so it must have been at least a year old even then, and now it was back in Hazzard again. She liked the movie. Mostly, she liked Paul Newman and figured Robert Redford would do in a pinch. Liked how the characters reminded her a bit of Luke and Bo and herself (sort of, Etta was Sundance's girlfriend, not his cousin – but ignoring that part Daisy could easily fantasize herself right into the story) right up until the end when Butch and Sundance got killed (most likely). That part made her sad.

But the problem wasn't the movie. It was Enos talking about the movie, saying he liked Butch and Sundance and all, but they were outlaws. They blew stuff up and stole stuff and even if they tried not to hurt anybody, they were law breakers. He didn't think they should have been shot, necessarily, but they definitely should have spent time in jail.

"They ain't real," she snapped. Arms across her chest as the two of them walked across the rough parking lot to his car, the heels of her shoes smacking against the pavement like punctuation to an anger she couldn't even explain. Sure, she'd thought of the main characters in the movie as being like her family and there Enos was, figuratively sending them to jail, but… it was like she said. They weren't real.

"Well, they was," Enos said, "back in the Wild West. They robbed real banks and trains and things." And real people had gotten hurt. She could admit that, and still—

"That's different," she answered. Her head swimming because she was trying to make a point and she wasn't entirely sure what it was. "That whole story is different," she added, though she didn't know for a fact that it was true. She had no idea how much of the film was based on actual history.

She and Enos had gotten to the car and stopped there. Squaring off for some reason and she couldn't swear that she wouldn't prefer just to get in and let him take her out for ice cream. Or home, or whatever he wanted, but there she was, in the middle of an argument that she'd started and didn't know how to stop. "Them real guys were bad," she conceded.

And the ones in the film were what? Just fun-loving outlaws? Okay, they were bad guys, too, but what was the point in going to the movie if you couldn't like the main characters? If you couldn't root for them instead of wanting to put them in jail?

"All right," Enos said, and even if she didn't want to argue, him agreeing with her (patronizing her?) wasn't at all satisfying.

She tucked a short lock behind her ear. Wondered at men and how easily they came to blows over nothing at all. And yet, they could just as easily let a subject drop without even arguing it.

She stepped away from the car door since he seemed to be waiting for her to move so he could open it for her. She let herself be guided into the car and figured she must just be really out of sorts. Instead of seeming gentlemanly this time, Enos' efforts felt like when Bo tried to do things for her. Like some kind of assumption that she was too weak or frail to open a car door. Solid thunk of the door closing beside her, then Enos got in the driver's side and started it up.

She couldn't say she was all that upset when he steered them away from the lights of town, the smells of the hotdog stand and car exhaust, and headed for the fresh air of the country. Toward home and it was reasonably early yet, but she just couldn't trust herself not to get angry all over again about Enos and Sundance and Butch.

"I reckon you're a million miles away," Enos said, and it wasn't a complaint or a rebuke. If it had been, she might have felt justified in keeping her mouth shut. But it was just an invitation. "A penny for your thoughts?" Oh, they were worth a dollar, at least. Maybe ten or twenty. "Something bothering you?"

Well, there was Luke and Jesse, duking it out in that silent way they had. Not fighting in the open because they couldn't. Not with houseguests and not with both of them knowing that no amount of arguing could make them agree.

Luke was sure that J.D. Hogg had it in for them. Jesse figured that the man wasn't exactly nice, but he wasn't crooked enough to go burning their barn. Dogging their moonshine runs – that seemed more likely. But Jesse wouldn't even allow as to how that was a possibility.

Then there were Bo and Alice. Alice following Bo around like a moon-eyed pup, Bo trying anything he could to get rid of her. Suggesting that she spend more time with Daisy so she could learn how to be more of a lady, and Alice halfway hurt and halfway willing to try anything at all to please Bo. Daisy felt bad for her, because if the Dukes were from the wrong side of the briar patch, Alice was from the wrong side of six or seven briar patches, and there was nothing she could do to turn Bo's head.

There was Molly sucking up just as much of Jesse's time as he would allow (and sometimes he would escape on mule-back for an hour or two just to get away from her), and there was the fact that when night came, both of their houseguests retired to Daisy's room with her. No privacy and no time to think her own thoughts about her own beau when the bedroom was overcrowded with chatter about Jesse and Bo. It was enough to make a girl squirrelly.

Then there was Bo, who thought it was Molly that was out to get them. Catching flies with honey or some-such thing; whatever Bo's logic was. Molly was a competitor for sure and they were having a hard time keeping up their own business with her around, but she was Jesse's friend, too. She wouldn't ever hurt him. Burn down his barn though—

She didn't know. And she couldn't tell Enos any of it, not really. He was a lawman and what the whole bunch of them did for a living was illegal. Even if Enos' own father had done the exact same thing (and probably still did), she couldn't talk to him about moonshining. Not as long as he wanted to put Paul Newman and Robert Redford in prison.

"Oh, you know," she said, anyway. "Just everybody's tense at home. After the fire, and all." That, at least, she was safe to say.

Enos stole a look in her direction, then went back to watching the road and the oncoming cars, his hands at perfect ten and two o'clock positions. They weren't quite out of the traffic patterns of town yet.

"Reckon that must have been scary," he said with a solid nod. "Waking up to that."

And watching Bo and Luke run right into the flames. Even Jesse had been too close with the hose and telling her to stay back by the spigot and the house. The searing heat, the smell, the livestock running loose and making all manner of racket that was still barely audible over the crackle and whoosh of sucking flames eating up dried wood. Luke going in that last time, Bo following, and she'd been torn between minding her uncle and running in after them or at least getting close enough to see. Then they came out, Luke heaving for any kind of a breath and Bo holding his hands funny and hollering in pain – scary barely touched the surface of what it had been.

She shook her head like it could make the memories go away.

"Reckon we could stop up at the overlook, if you want," Enos offered. Which was a pull-off up along State Route 21 on Thorny Hill. It didn't over look much of anything at night, but unlike Kissing Cliff, it was private and quiet and maybe she did want him to take her there. So she nodded her agreement.

The air gusting through the windows was blowing her hair around and try though she did, she couldn't keep it tucked behind her ears. It was bound to be a rat's nest at the end of the night, and for now she was grateful to the darkness for hiding how she must look.

The car slowed and the gravel crunched under the wheels as Enos navigated out onto the pull off that led to the overlook. Too soon, the engine cut off and they were left with the sound of crickets and, somewhere down below in the pond, bellowing bullfrogs. And otherwise silence because she couldn't think of a single thing to say.

"I got another penny," Enos offered. "For more of your thoughts." But there weren't any that she could talk about.

She shuffled a little closer to him; it wasn't chilly, exactly, but that was what she'd say if he asked her for a reason. The vinyl of the bench seat was easy to slide across in her cotton skirt and his weight made for a convenient downhill slope. Before long she was at that place where putting her head on his shoulder was a foregone conclusion.

A big hand came up and patted her awkwardly on the ear. She figured maybe he was going for her hair, didn't worry too much about how it went astray. He wasn't complaining about where she was or what she was doing, and that was enough. His hand dropped back into his own lap.

"Bo and Luke are rebuilding the barn, ain't they?" he asked. "Sheriff said something about them getting lumber."

That made her head come up again. Sure, the lumber they'd ordered had been delivered, and it wasn't any secret that the family was going to rebuild. Still, she wasn't too sure she liked hearing that the sheriff knew what they were doing.

"They planning on asking for help at the Sunday service?" Because that was a fairly common practice. A family would announce a barn raising at church, and every able-bodied man would show up to help. The women would come too, with fried chicken and potato salad and pickled peaches, and it would turn into a big old picnic. And by the end of a day there'd be a new barn where there was only empty space before. In need of a coat of paint and some finishing touches, maybe, but for all practical purposes, done.

"Don't know." Probably not. There were enough people nosing around their business right now as it was.

"Well, if they do and I ain't there, let me know. I'd be right proud to help." Sure he would, and his intentions were good, too. There was no reason he couldn't. But then again, maybe she didn't want him there. Not with Alice and Molly and Lord knew what the two of them might say. Plus, _Tilly_ was only one barn over and though she wouldn't be loaded with 'shine, she'd be a big old beacon to someone like Enos, who knew moonshining from the inside.

Besides, she wasn't too sure about rebuilding the barn when they didn't know who had burned the one they used to have, or who had been interfering with their moonshine deliveries.

"Daisy," he said, and his arm came around her then. Less stiff than the head-patting had been, more of an easy, fluid motion that went to prove that maybe Enos did know how to properly court in a car after all. "You ain't still scared, are you?"

She shrugged – she was, but she wasn't about to admit it. Keeping pace with Bo and Luke all her life taught her to keep mum on that sort of thing, unless she wanted Luke put a halt to her involvement, so she kept her mouth shut. Mostly.

"Now Daisy, I'm a lawman now. I aim to look after you and protect you. You ain't got nothing to worry about."

Oh, she had plenty to worry about. But it was nice to hear him say it, nice to feel the way he tightened his arm around her, nice how when she turned to look at him, he kissed her. Honest to goodness kissed her on the lips and she figured she could give up her worries for a little while anyway, and just enjoy where she was and who she was with.

* * *

 _July 26, 1974_

"And then, see, in this box you put the ten-code of the violation. You see?"

"Yes, sir."

Enos was annoying, but he was polite. He was sitting at one of the old deputies' desks in the sheriff's station, perfectly upright of posture like a good schoolboy. And his forehead was so wrinkled that it was pushing up that silly deputy hat – the one he'd bought with his first paycheck – almost to the point where it might just pop right off his head.

"Well do you see, or don't you?" He was trying to be patient, he really was. But the boy's eyebrows were saying no even as his mouth said yes.

"Yes, sir," Enos repeated, slow hesitance to his words. "I see. It's just, isn't this summons for the violator? Doesn't it go on their windshield?"

"Of course it goes on their windshield, Enos. Where were you going to put it, on their tailpipe?" He let out a little giggle. Sometimes, Rosco figured, he was pretty funny. It was too bad that not many other people seemed to get his jokes.

"No, I would put it on their windshield," Enos answered in complete seriousness. Just as honest and earnest as the day was long. (And the day was already far, far too long, even if it was still before noon.) "It's just, that box says 'nature of violation.'"

"Right," Rosco said, and wondered how schoolteachers had ever put up with Enos and his slow ways. "And that's why you put the ten code in there. Ten-ninety for a fire zone violation, ten-ninety-one for a no parking zone…"

"But," Enos interrupted. "There ain't no place else to put a 'nature of violation' on the ticket."

"Of course there's not, Enos!" Rosco was pacing back and forth behind the deputy, wishing he could be out driving instead. There were no violators here in the sheriff's office, no one to chase or threaten or otherwise exert his authority over. Except for Enos, who was too busy leading him around in pointless circles to even understand when authority was being exerted. "You don't need two places to say the same thing. Once you've said it once, you ain't got to say it again."

"But, Sheriff," the boy contradicted, and Rosco was considering taking him over his knee. He was a bit big for it, but Enos would probably comply well enough. He'd let himself be spanked, but then he'd go right back to his infernal questions. "If we just leave this on their windshield and we put a ten code into that box, and only you and me know the ten codes, how will they ever know what their violations are? Shouldn't we write out the words of what they did wrong?"

"Enos!" he snapped. This was all the rookie deputy's fault, for insisting on being trained. For saying that he wanted to take over the evening shift so Rosco could go home at a reasonable hour instead of being on duty from dawn to past dusk, and then being on call all night. He wanted to be a real help around here, he said. But then he was resisting the training at every step. Coming up with excuses for why the way Rosco did things needed changing.

Plus, that other thing he kept saying.

"Down in Savannah," yep, those were the very words that were going to get Enos spanked. Sent to bed without dinner if he said them one more time, or maybe Rosco could just lock him in a jail cell. "We used to write out the violations in words."

"This ain't Savannah." Seemed obvious enough to him. Then his mouth started to trip over words, the same as it had ever since he was a boy. "Jit! Just—Ijit!" Oh, this lesson was going swimmingly. If the fool didn't just obey him soon, Rosco's stomach was just going to turn to mush. And then he'd be dealing with the taste of breakfast repeating on him. "Do what I said, now, do it like I do."

"Yes, sir," Enos agreed, head down and studying the summons in front of him. A blank parking ticket, and if the boy couldn't manage that, how would they ever get around to moving violations, much less genuine criminal activities?

And Rosco had better things to do. At least he thought he did – there had to be better things to do than pace the floor of the squad room while a dipstick deputy stumbled over learning the basics of the trade. Enos was thorough, he'd give him that. Thoroughly annoying.

Rosco should be out on the road. Should be doing what J.D. Hogg suggested, maybe. Investigating the Dukes' barn burning, watching Molly Snodgrass and Jesse Duke for signs that they were up to something serious, something worse than moonshining. But it was hard to investigate a barn that wasn't there anymore, especially when those Duke boys were there asking him when he would get around to actually finding and arresting whoever did it. Luke, with his suspicious stares and Bo with his grinning sass, which made trying to secretly interrogate them a useless task. Not to mention Jesse's grumbles and mumbles and sly comments that somehow felt like insults, even if Rosco didn't entirely understand them.

Then there was the earnest boy in front of him, trying to consign himself to evening shift work when he had himself a girl. Oh, Rosco had seen the two of them walking around town together or just sitting on the library steps, more than once. They were cute enough and at least they didn't go groping each other in public. It was a little cofounding that she was Daisy Duke, of all people. (Then again, that could be useful. Which was a rotten thought the likes of which J.D. Hogg would come up with, so Rosco banished it from him mind. Mostly.) But the boy was trying to tie himself up in the evenings, which would make a shambles of his stumbling little love life.

(And then there was that thought that Rosco didn't want to think at all – that if he'd only had Enos here and willing to help him out about six months ago, he'd probably still be cuddling up in dark corners with his sweet Bessie Mae.)

The boy wanted to give Rosco time off, which was noble enough. At least Rosco was sure that the idea started in a noble place. It was just ridiculous, was all. Because sure, he'd let Enos take the evening shift and even let him patrol in the only cruiser that the county could afford. But Rosco would just have to borrow his mother's old jalopy and shadow the kid. He'd still be working just as hard, he figured. At least until he could trust Enos on his own. Which might be in a decade or three, as slow as this boy was at learning.

And then there was the fact that once he finished training Enos, he'd have to arm him. There were plenty of revolvers in storage from when he'd last had deputies, so that wasn't precisely a problem. It was just that it was hard to imagine Enos with a service weapon. But he'd trained on those in Savannah, too.

"But sheriff?" And there he went contradicting the duly elected law of the land again. "Would it be okay if I also wrote out the words of the violation, too, after I write in the ten code? Just so folks will know what they did wrong?"

He sighed so hard it just about hurt his chest. "Fine, Enos." He wasn't giving in, not really. He just wanted to move on to the next box on the summons form, was all. So they could finish this tedious task sometime before midnight. "Do what you want."


	14. Elbows and Swamp Ghosts

**Fourteen: Elbows and Swamp Ghosts**

 _July 28, 1974_

Elbows were a problem. Had been for over two weeks, but today Luke was considering whether he really needed his, or if he could manage to live life without them. (Chores would be tricky, baling hay would be nearly impossible. Still, he wasn't entirely convinced he couldn't get by without. Let Bo do all the heavy work for a change.)

Heat was a problem, too, sweat dripping down his neck, and there were just too many people at the kitchen table. The picnic table outside almost seemed appealing until he remembered that there was nothing to sit on at either end, which would leave them in two rows of three and make matters even worse.

"Pass the salt please," came from Daisy on the diagonal from him. It was tempting to toss it in her direction or just reach across the middle of the table and hand it off, but he couldn't. Bad manners, so he passed it to Jesse, who passed it to Alice, who passed it to Daisy, elbows knocking against elbows all the way.

Then he figured out that he should have used the salt before he passed it, and settled himself to enduring a bland meal, because it just wasn't worth the trouble of getting the salt back.

Molly and Alice had to go.

It had been a problem all along, the elbows thing. But today had been the worst. Starting with church, which they'd skipped last week, but Jesse was adamant that they had to attend today. All of them, because no one under Jesse Duke's roof was immune to his rules – when he decided to enforce them, that was.

The church pew wasn't made to fit six across, at least not when two of them were Alice and Jesse. The morning had been spent in a careful arrangement that had been tricky to accomplish when two of the people involved didn't understand the sequence (and wouldn't have been helpful if they did). Bo at one end, Jesse at the other, and Luke and Daisy at strategic intervals in between to keep Molly away from Jesse and Alice away from Bo. Tight squeeze, but they managed it.

Until they needed hymnals as the organ music swelled for the first hymn of the morning. Then it was a free-for-all. They leaned forward and each tried to grab their own from the little holders in front of them, which didn't work when there were only three hymnals in total. Luke took an elbow to his ribs and figured that if Alice wanted the hymnal that bad, she could have it. He didn't intend to wrestle her for it.

(Though once the singing started he might have wished he'd knocked her down to the hard floorboards and left her there. Girl had a tin ear and a motor mouth. Bad combination. But no, he knew better than to hit girls.)

Daisy, on his other side, stuck her pointy little elbow in his rib cage a little later on, after they'd all sung a few more times, then sat to hear the sermon. A fine homily about sharing and forgiving. Luke had shared all he intended to, and God forgive him, if Daisy elbowed him one more time—

Finally, his cousin quit jabbing at him and just plain pointed. Alice had drifted off into a snooze somewhere in the sharing part and now that they were on to forgiving, she was tipping forward and getting ready to face-plant onto the curled edge of the pew in front of them. So he used his elbow to prop her back up. Would have been fine if she hadn't wakened with a start and a clearly audible "whoo!" That was when Jesse, all the way at the far end, had leveled the whole row of them with a glare. After that, they all sat quietly and with relative attention until the benediction was offered and church was over.

The after-church rounds of visiting were tricky, too, with the elbows, the seating arrangements in the cars, and Molly's pickup being dang narrow. Luke figured women should all ride together, leaving him to go with Bo and Jesse, but Daisy's squint made clear that unless Luke wanted Molly and Alice as roommates at night, he'd best make a sacrifice of himself and ride with them through the afternoon.

So they made their crushing rounds to the Crabtrees and the Brandts and the Gibsons up on Hyacinth Lane, which was as bumpy as an oversized toad and led to all manner of elbows everywhere as they bounced along. Luke reckoned it was only through luck and quick maneuvering that he would still be able to have children.

And now it was mid-day meal at a table that normally sat four, and hadn't even sat as many as five since he and Bo and Daisy were all a lot smaller. The six of them arranged themselves with the same careful attention to who ended up where, keeping a safe distance between all the right parties. But even with Bo at one end and Jesse at the other, plus the use of those two rickety folding chairs that normally stood on the back porch, things were a mite crowded at the table. Had been ever since that first day that Molly and Alice showed up with their tale of woe, but after a day of knocking elbows, Luke had about had it. Not to mention that Molly was left-handed to Luke's right, and had bony elbows to boot.

"Oh," Alice said somewhere in the middle of working her way through about a quart of beef stew (that was far more stew than beef, what with stretching it six ways instead of four). "Cousin Molly, reckon I need to go back into the swamp."

Bo's smile could have lit up an entire city.

"Not for keeps," Alice added, with a careful look at Molly. Luke could have been wrong (as unlikely as that was) but he would have sworn that Alice was looking to her cousin for cues or approval. Like this was a stage-show and she was making sure she got her lines right. "But just to get that thing."

 _That thing_. Well, that was descriptive.

Molly nodded knowingly. "Don't stay any longer than you have to," she advised. "Just get it and come right back."

"What thing?" Luke asked, because someone had to. Bo wasn't likely to speak to Alice directly unless he absolutely had to, Jesse was staring at Molly with a curious look on his face and otherwise not talking, and Daisy was eating her stew with all good cheer because at least she'd gotten a chance to put some salt into it.

"My thing," Alice repeated, like a needle stuck in a groove. Put down her fork and struck a very stiff pose, shoulders square, face blank. Seemed like an attempt at looking serious.

"What kind of thing?" Luke asked again. "Big thing, small thing? We got plenty of things here at the farm, ain't we?"

"You bet," Bo jumped in, because he'd talk to Luke. Just not Alice.

"Maybe we already got the very thing you need."

"No," Alice said, lowering her eyes. Dipping her chin in an effort to look coy or shy and failing miserably at both. "It's a womanly thing."

Bo wasn't even chewing and he choked on something. Jesse was suddenly deeply engaged in a study of the contents (paltry as they had to be at this point) of his coffee cup, and Daisy was too busy being amused at the discomfort of her male relatives to be of any help. That or she was daydreaming about Enos – that girl's sense had gone the way of her long hair. Luke could only hope that her smarts would grow back in time the same as her hair would.

"And I need it," Alice reinforced.

"All right," Molly agreed with her, because no one else could even find their tongue. Luke was considering whether the goats required immediate milking or if Maudine's oat supply was low enough to justify an urgent expedition into town. In absence of either of those excuses to leave the house, he might just have to spontaneously kill and pluck a chicken, never mind that they were already eating beef. "Just be careful. You know that swamp is dangerous."

Sure it was, and most of what made it dangerous was sitting right there next to him, eating dinner.

"Oh, my," Alice said, eyes popping wide, as if she were suddenly aware that bad things could happen to her in the swamp. Like she hadn't already spent about two weeks here at the Duke farm because of whatever she claimed to fear back there. "I reckon what I need is a big, strong man to go with me into the swamp and protect me." Sure, because it wasn't like Alice couldn't take down a bear with a wrestling hold, if she was of a mind to.

"I ain't going with you," and look who had just found his voice. And dropped his fork while there was still food on his plate. Bo was very serious about this. He was not going to accompany Alice into the swamp.

"Bo," came the warning from Jesse.

"No, sir, I won't do it."

And Alice's round, solemn face tipped even lower in a pantomime of sadness over the "womanly thing" that she would be denied because of Bo's refusal to be of help.

Molly reached diagonally across the table to pat her hand. "Don't you fret now, Alice. I can go with you. Of course, I ain't particularly big, nor strong," not unless strong-willed counted. "And I ain't a man like Bo there, but I can do my best to protect you."

Bo's sigh was a deflated balloon after the party was over. He'd lost and he knew it.

"Now, Molly, Alice," Jesse intervened, just like everyone knew he would. "You ain't got to worry none. I'm sure Bo would be thrilled to help Alice out. Wouldn't you Bo?"

No, he would not. His ears were red and his hands were in tight little fists.

"Yes, sir," not to mention those clenched teeth, but he would do it anyway. Because he respected his Uncle Jesse and valued his hind end.

Funny thing if the corner of Alice's face didn't curl into a smile. For a second, anyway, until Molly squeezed her hand, and she went serious again.

"And just to make sure she's double safe, I'm sure Luke wouldn't mind riding along."

Oh yes, he would. But then again, Bo was looking at him, now, instead of the plate in front of him. Biting his lip with all the hope of a dog begging for table scraps. Besides, it wouldn't hurt Luke any to go along. (Unless Alice decided that killing him was the best way to make sure he stayed out of her nefarious plans for Bo.)

"I'll ride along," he agreed, even if he figured it'd be more fun to pull out his teeth, one by one, using nothing more than a pair of pliers and brute force.

* * *

Jesse had lent them _Tilly_ , and that might have been the one saving grace to this whole disaster. The old man said that the car knew its way around the swamp better than any of them (save Molly) and would get them out of trouble if they got themselves in.

Luke had helped by saying that if they were going in a moonshine runner and Bo was driving, he had to navigate. Which meant sitting up front, and a pouting Alice was sent to the back seat. Jesse didn't have a problem with that, just waved goodbye as they drove off. Bo figured that if nothing else had, surely sitting alone in back would make Alice call an end to this ruse. But all she'd done was put on a weird pair of sunglasses with large, red frames and very dark glass in them. Like she was some sort of a movie star and needed to hide her identity. In the swamp, because everyone knew it was full of paparazzi.

(No, it was full of gators, and some rotten part of him wanted to feed Alice to them. And didn't because the minute she was in the water and in any sort of real trouble, he and Luke would have to go in to save her.)

"Go left," Alice said. She was leading this little expedition through the swamp, even if she was in the back.

"If I go left, I'll be in the bog," Bo complained. A _womanly_ thing, she'd said. Whatever that meant and Luke ought to have asked her to be more specific about that. (Except he'd gone a bit green around the edges when she'd said the words. Looked like a man who wanted to know nothing at all as pertained to _womanly_ things.)

"She means up there," Luke clarified, pointing ahead at a fork in the razor-thin trail they were driving along. Bo knew his way around the swamp, and then again, there were places he'd never been. This was one of them, Molly's cabin was another. He and Luke hadn't ever been there, and he supposed Jesse hadn't, either. Maybe the only ones who knew where it was for sure were Molly and her kin.

"We're going in circles," he mumbled to Luke, got an affirming nod. Because he didn't know where he was, but he had some idea of where he'd been.

"Reckon it's best if we don't approach the cabin directly," Alice explained. Which was a surprise when he didn't figure there was any way she should have heard him over the drone of the engine. Not to mention the way the open windows let in every chirp and burrap of the swamp animals discussing whatever their swamp business was. Maybe Alice was part swamp-animal, too. "You never know who may be watching." Ah, the wavering in her voice, her false fear. J.D. Hogg was a better actor than she was, and he couldn't act to save his life.

"What was it, exactly, that you and Molly was so sacred of?" Luke asked. "I don't reckon me and Bo have rightly heard." Not a whole lot, anyway, just a vague outline. Jesse might have gotten details from Molly, but if he had, he hadn't shared them.

"Go left!" Alice insisted again.

Bo went left.

"You ain't answered my question," Luke pointed out. Tried to look casual while grabbing onto the roof of the car for dear life. Would have worked, too, if he hadn't also reached for the dashboard with his other hand. Then the car leveled out again and they were traveling along another thin path through the thick undergrowth, under the continual threat of driving into the bog somewhere.

"Swamp ghosts," Molly explained, matter-of-factly.

Luke looked at him and he looked at Luke. Funny pull to his cousin's face, like a smirk trying to break out on one side of his mouth only.

"Swamp ghosts?" Luke echoed.

"That's ridiculous," Bo put in.

He would have liked to believe that he could annoy Alice. Not hurt her feelings, he never liked to do that to any woman, even one that was strong enough to lock him into a fairly decent full-nelson. But to annoy and make her not want to be around him, that would be good. And he couldn't manage it no matter how rude he was. Furtive glances in the rearview went to prove that she was studying the back of his head in complete adoration. (At least as well as he could tell when she was wearing those ridiculous glasses.)

 _Tilly_ shuddered a bit. Bo put his foot on the clutch and Luke shifted them into second, left-handed. Trudging through sand was making the old girl colicky.

"They ain't really ghosts," she explained. "It's just, the swamp gets so thick with fog—turn left up here—that you can't see nothing, you can only hear it."

"Left again?" How many circles was she going to lead them in? "You trying to turn _us_ into swamp ghosts?"

Alice, being Alice, didn't get upset about his outburst. She just went on: "And the swamp ain't like where you city folks live."

"City folks," Luke mumbled under his breath, shaking his head.

Alice, being Alice, didn't care at all what Luke had to say. "There ain't no light at all, so if it's cloudy or there's no moon, you can't see nothing at all at night. And mostly that's fine because don't no one come into the swamp at night." Except Duke boys ridding themselves of revenuers. But they'd never been this deep in. Heck, Bo hadn't really known that there was a this deep to go in. "'Cepting the gators and the snakes. Maybe the coyotes, but mostly it's just frogs you hear. But Molly heard voices." Bo risked another glimpse into the rearview. "Swamp ghosts," Alice finished with a firm nod.

Luke elbowed him and pointed forward. _Eyes on the road, Bo_. Except this wasn't much of anything like a road. More like a deer path.

"So these swamp ghosts, you didn't hear them? Just Molly?" Luke asked.

"And I thought you said they wasn't really ghosts," Bo added, rubbing his still-healing right palm on his jeans. It itched, which was better than the way it had hurt for the better part of two weeks. Luke elbowed him again. _Both hands on the wheel._ Or maybe, _quit that or it'll scar_. Not that there was much hope the he wouldn't be left with a number of scars. At least they were on his palms and one wrist, not his face.

"They ain't ghosts. They're men. Probably come to ravage me and Molly."

"Ravage," Bo said, had to stop to get his breath between giggles. "You and Molly?"

"She heard gunshots, too," Alice clarified. Probably still staring at the back of his head with all the love in the world, even if he was laughing at her. (Shouldn't, it wasn't nice. Luke ought to be telling him to mind his manners. Probably would, too, once he got done snickering into his hand.) "Plus, our chickens and goats went missing." Right, there had been something about livestock.

"You keep goats in the swamp?" Seemed strange, somehow.

"Got to get milk somewhere." And that was the thing about Alice. She didn't get annoyed at him and she didn't talk down to him either. He'd just asked a dumb question, but she'd answered it like it was perfectly normal.

"You got a barn?" Luke asked.

"Of course we do." Now, Luke, she wasn't quite as sweet to him.

"Don't suppose it's been burned," Bo remarked. Tried to sound casual, but he figured Luke knew better. Was probably getting ready to say it was J.D. Hogg and not Molly who'd burned their barn.

"Go left," Alice said instead of answering him.

"Left again?"

"Alice," Luke said. His tone was serious, even if his cheek was still twitching. "You got me and Bo here with you to protect you. There ain't no reason we can't go straight to the cabin instead of driving in circles."

"Did you see that?" Alice asked.

No, he hadn't seen a thing.

"What?" Luke asked. "Alice…"

Bo checked the rearview to find Alice ducked low in the seat, those dark glasses over her eyes, and just barely peeping out the side window.

"I didn't see nothing," Bo offered up. "Except this here path getting dang narrow." A sea of growth all around them – he'd never realized just how green the swamp was. Then again, he wasn't in the habit of coming here during daylight.

"I didn't see nothing, either," Luke agreed. But he felt something, same thing Bo did. _Tilly_ shivered, like she didn't much like their speed or the terrain. Then she settled again, and Luke shrugged. "Just take us to the cabin."

"I ain't sure that's a good idea." Alice wasn't much of an actress, but she was doing a half-decent job of making her voice waver now. "Maybe," she said, and she was still hiding back there, "maybe I could use Daisy's womanly things."

Luke's hand went up to his eyebrows, gave them a firm rub. Somewhere between being disgusted by the conversation and the undeniable reality that this was nothing more than a wild goose chase, he must have developed a headache.

"I'll turn her around."

"Did you see that?"

No, because there was nothing to see. Especially not when he was concentrating on putting the car into reverse and figuring out whether he had enough room to maneuver or if he was just going to have to get out of here backing all the way.

"Alice," Luke scolded.

Bo decided on just plain backing out. Felt _Tilly_ resist him at first, pressed down a little harder on the accelerator. Heard the car struggle, saw the wet sand flying up around them. Put his foot down harder.

 _RRR-rrr_ was what Tilly had to say on that matter.

"Bo," Luke said. Got only that far and then _Tilly_ 's engine shuddered, groaned and died, leaving the three of them to listen to the frogs croak and wonder what a swamp ghost really sounded like.

* * *

"Molly."

It was kind of cute, really, the way that Jesse tolerated the adoration of their swamp-raised guest. Much better Bo behaved toward Alice.

"I'm just saying Jess…"

Daisy ought to be ashamed, maybe. Eavesdropping wasn't nice, but then again, someone had to hang out the washing to dry. Otherwise they'd all be walking around naked come tomorrow, considering the mound of dirty laundry they'd created and the fact that none of them had much of anything left in their closets (or suitcases, in the case of Alice and Molly). An absence of clothing would have been an unmitigated disaster, what with the way Alice felt about Bo and Molly felt about Jesse.

And it wasn't exactly Daisy's fault that the drying rack was close to the milking stump, or that Jesse liked to sit there and pat the goats. Or that Molly had decided to follow him there and flirt with him. So if eavesdropping was bad, it wasn't like she was doing it of her own accord. It was just circumstances forcing themselves upon her.

"It was a long time ago."

"I remember those days so clearly. You were such a dashing young man."

Daisy dropped one of Bo's pairs of jeans in the attempt to hang them. Decided that it must have everything to do with how long they were and how heavy they got when they were wet. Certainly couldn't have happened because she wasn't looking at what she was doing, or because she was busy watching the back of Uncle Jesse's neck go red.

"And so responsible. Looking out for your brothers after losing your parents so young."

Daisy bent to pick up the jeans, assessed the damage. They were dirty in spots, and though Bo would probably never notice, she took them over to the porch anyway to rewash them when she was done with her hanging. (Which might be awhile, at least if Molly was of a mind to sweet talk her uncle all day.)

Molly was a crafty sort, Daisy would give her that. Sneaky and sly in a way that Jesse might admire, if he wasn't quite so irritated by how she went about it. Pushing up against his resistance and the old-timer was digging in his hoofs like a cantankerous mule. Daisy figured that Molly knew full well that Alice's bid for Bo's attentions would end up with both Duke boys taking her out to the swamp, and wasn't too sorry about it, either. With Luke acting as chaperon to keep Alice's virtue intact (even if Alice was perfectly willing to give it up), Molly could make her own play.

"You went right quick from playing the field to announcing your engagement to Lavinia Baldridge. Which I always reckoned was because you wanted to give your brothers some kind of a mother after you all lost yours."

"Well," Jesse answered, noncommittally. Left it at that.

"And then you lost Lavinia so young, too."

Daisy felt a pang of loyalty toward her aunt. Wondered if, like her cousins were, she ought to be annoyed by Molly's overtures toward their uncle. But, no, Lavinia had been gone some time now. There was no reason that Jesse shouldn't find someone to love him, and no reason Molly shouldn't try to be that someone. Men were fools about such things. Often enough it took a woman's nudge to make them see the good thing standing right in front of them.

Daisy went back to her hanging, untangling one of Bo's shirts, with its endless arms, from the rest of the pile of wet clothes. Humming to keep herself company as she thought about what to make for the picnic lunch she and Enos were going to have on Wednesday—

"Now, Molly," interrupted Daisy's thoughts. "You're a guest here and you're welcome to whatever I got, but I don't reckon that's any of your concern."

Well. That was downright rude for Jesse. (Would have been perfectly normal for Luke, but then again, Luke wasn't nearly as gentlemanly as their uncle was.)

Daisy shifted around the side of the overhead drying rack. Mainly so she could hang Molly's dress in a place where it would have plenty of space to dry. The fact that where she stood now afforded her a better view of Jesse and Molly was just an accidental bonus.

"Why, Jess," Molly put a hand on his bicep. "I didn't mean no harm. I was just wondering if you still had any mementos of your time with her is all. Any documents or letters or things. Maybe a recipe book."

"Molly," Jesse warned again. "There ain't no Duke recipes that you need to be worrying about none."

Of course, the most important Duke recipe wasn't even written down. Jesse always said it was a fool hoping to be robbed that would put his moonshining recipe on paper. Dukes had passed it down orally and committed it to memory for at least six generations. (And before that, most of them couldn't read, anyway.)

"Not that kind of recipe, Jess," Molly scolded, but her uncle's hackles were up. "Something I could cook for you to eat that maybe you been missing since she's been gone."

Daisy had to walk back to where she'd left the basket of wet garments to get the next one, and lost sight of the couple for a moment. Bent to pick up a slip and stood up abruptly when she heard her name.

"Daisy's a fine, cook." That was Jesse. "Lavinia taught her everything she knew." Well, sort of. Daisy had only lived here for six months before Lavinia was gone. She'd tried to do as well as her aunt, but she'd burnt many a meal before she got it right. Besides, Jesse was an excellent cook himself. "All from memory. Didn't never need to write nothing down." True enough – Lavinia had a recipe box stashed in a high cabinet over the refrigerator in the kitchen. But what was in there was older than Lavinia, had been passed down by ancestors. Lavinia herself hadn't ever needed to write anything down.

"Well, maybe I'm just a sentimental old fool, but I figure a man marries a woman and stays with her for twenty-some-odd years, he's got to love her. And he's got to miss her when she's gone. You must have kept some of her things," Molly was insisting, and maybe, just maybe, Bo had a point about Molly and Alice and the timing of their arrival here at the farm. And just exactly what they were up to. "Ain't you got any old letters or nothing?"

"Us Dukes ain't never had much," Jesse said. "Except love," he linked his fingers together and held them out in front of him to show her just how close the Dukes were. "Everything I need, I got right here," he added, separating his hands and putting one over his heart. "And here," he added, pointing to his head. "And there," he added, turning and pointing at Daisy, who flushed and made a really big show of studying the slip in her hands for any dirt or stains she might have missed in the washing. Funny how there weren't any, same as hadn't been when she'd checked it before rinsing it a while back. Up on her toes and reaching for a clothespin off the rack because she was busy. Very busy with no chance to eavesdrop on anything at all. Nope, not her.

"And out there in the swamp," Jesse finished. "With your cousin, and come to think of it, them three have been gone an awful long time."

A light gust of wind made the slip flap in her face, leaving a wet streak behind and making her miss what Jesse said next. She smacked it out of the way, but it was light and slippery, and nearly slipped out of the clothespin. She caught it in one hand and pulled it down so she could start hanging it from scratch. Sending it flying across the farmyard in her carelessness would leave her with awfully awkward explanations to make.

"Now, Jess, don't you fret. Alice ain't going to let them get hurt."

Get hurt? Why would Bo and Luke be hurt on a little trip into the swamp in the daytime, when they had spent many a night outrunning revenuers in there? And hadn't it been for Alice's protection that they'd gone in the first place?

"I'd feel better," Jesse said, standing up with knee-popping slowness, "if I knew that for a fact. Excuse me, Molly, reckon I'll go give them a call on the C.B."

"Oh, now Jess," Molly said, following along behind as the old man waddled deceptively quickly across the yard to his truck. "You ain't got to do that. I'm sure they're fine."

Bonnie Mae bleated her displeasure at the sudden abandonment, but for once Jesse didn't console or scold her, just kept right on moving toward his truck.

"Jess…" Molly registered her own protest. Jesse's resolve was not moved.

"My big toe's a'grumbling," he explained. "And I ain't going to rest easy until I talk to my boys."

"You ain't going to be able to reach them."

Daisy dropped the slip back into the basket with the rest of the wet laundry and headed toward her uncle and the pickup. Big toes were nothing to be ignored, not when they were on Uncle Jesse's foot. And aching, because Jesse's toes were downright telepathic when it came to Bo and Luke and trouble.

"What do you mean, I ain't going to be able to reach them?" Molly might have known Jesse long before Daisy even got born, and she might think she knew him well, but she didn't know a darn thing about him. Not if she thought that worrying him about the boys was a good idea. "You ain't had Alice do nothing to their CB, did you?" Nope, if Molly wanted to court Uncle Jesse, the woman was going to have to learn that the safety of his kids, especially the boys, always came first. Before dating, before eating, before breathing – Bo and Luke and Daisy came before everything.

"No." The answer came too fast to be reassuring. "Jess, you know me better than that." Jesse reached in through the pickup window and grabbed the CB mic.

"I know you awful well, Molly," Jesse answered and it wasn't exactly agreeing with her or accepting her protests of innocence. "Lost sheep, you out there? Bo? Luke?"

There was plenty of static out there, nothing else.

"Jesse, there ain't much by way of CB signal in the swamp. Now why don't you just settle down and come on inside. I can make you some tea…"

"I don't want no tea, Molly, I want my boys. And that there antenna on my truck," he added, pointing around the CB mic to the pickup's roof and the hardware affixed up there. "It's strong enough to pick up signals from here to Hatchapee. Ain't never had trouble talking to them boys when they was in the swamp before." He brought the mic back to his mouth. "Bo, Luke, you'd best answer me now," was closer to pleading than a threat.

"They ain't never been in the swamp that deep before," Molly said. "They ain't never been to my cabin before."

"Got me a feeling they ain't at your cabin now. Daisy, you get in this here truck and you try to reach the boys. Molly, you and me's getting in your pickup, and you are taking me to where the boys and Alice are. Daisy's going to follow us." Daisy nodded and took the keys from her uncle when they were offered. "I should have known, you wouldn't never let no outsiders, not even us Dukes, know where your cabin was. Where'd she take them, Molly?"

"Why Jess, I don't know what you're talking about."

"Get in the truck," Jesse commanded, either to Daisy or to Molly and it was hard to tell which. "You follow us close," Jesse added, then pointed Molly off to her ancient heap of a truck. "Molly here's going to go as fast as she can and not lose you."

Daisy started the pickup. "Bo? Luke? Are y'all out there?" she called into the CB as she watched Jesse hustle Molly across the farmyard. "Can y'all hear me?"

And the CB gave her nothing but static.


	15. Seven-Eighths of the Way to China

**Fifteen: Seven-Eighths of the Way to China**

 _July 29, 1974_

"Sheriff," Enos said. Every day it was getting a little less annoying to have the boy around him.

But only a little less, not a lot less, which was why Rosco barked, "What, Enos? Can't you see I'm trying to fill out a duty roster here?"

"Well yes, sir. But I reckon there's only two of us, so there ain't a lot of roster to fill out. I mean, there's you in the morning and me in the evening and then alternate Saturdays and Sun—"

"I know how to fill out a duty roster, Enos."

"Yes, sir."

Rosco tipped his head down to look at the paperwork on his desk. The same grid he'd filled out for his whole professional life, except for the last several months it had only been his own name in all the boxes. Now he was working out where to put _Coltrane_ and where to put _Strate_ , and the fool was standing there in front of him, shuffling on his feet and fiddling with the hat in his hands.

"Enos," he said, rolling his eyes up to look at the boy. Got a twitch in response. "What?"

"I'll wait," was the magnanimous offer, and sure enough, Enos would wait as long as anyone wanted him to. It was just that he'd do it with the sort of loud silence that kept Rosco from thinking.

The thing was, Enos was early. Deputies, in Rosco's experience, were mostly full of excuses about why they were late. They didn't show up early, and definitely not four hours early. In full uniform, such as it was. Still no badge, but then again, no one in Hazzard would ever notice.

This was supposed to be Rosco's quiet time, his chance to do all his important sheriffly duties without disruption and then there was Enos, standing in front of him and needing attention. Training was done, the boy had handled his first solo shift yesterday. As far as Rosco knew, it had gone fine. There had been no incident reports filed, anyway.

Rosco put down his pen and reached for his mug. It was going to take coffee (and maybe a couple of tranquilizers) to tolerate whatever was going on with Enos this morning. At least what was in his mug tasted halfway like coffee instead of the usual mud. Rosco figured he ought to thank Enos and his coffee-making skills for that. If he didn't strangle him, first.

"Just say it," he decided. Get it over with and then maybe he could send the fool off and tell him not to show up again until his shift officially started. Which was tricky, when Rosco hadn't finished the duty roster yet so Enos had no official start time. (Still, the boy's face showed up here four hours earlier than Rosco wanted to see it.)

"Well, now, I don't want to be a bother."

 _Bother_ didn't begin to describe what Enos was.

"Spit it out, boy, or I'll take you out back and whip you." Which didn't much seem like the right thing to say to a deputy, but then it always used to work when Rosco's daddy said it him as a wee slip of a lad.

"Yes, sir." Now they were getting somewhere. The boy respected authority, which might have been the only good thing about him. (Along with his ability to brew a decent cup of coffee, which Rosco appreciated all over again when he took himself another sip.) "Only, I'm not sure it's really much of anything at all."

Rosco wondered whether it would be a worse idea to throw his coffee – mug and all – at Enos, or just to put his head down on the desk and cry. It was a shame that he couldn't really do either, because both were very, very tempting.

"If it ain't nothing," he said, and an unplanned (and unwanted) _ijit!_ might have slipped out first. "Then you don't come in to work early and stand there looking at me."

"I'm sorry," Enos said, and looked away. Not down in shame, not at anything in particular. Just noticeably not at Rosco. "It's something, just maybe nothing important."

"Enos." He was being patient. Very, very patient and he was only yelling a little and not half as loudly as he wanted to. "Just tell me what this maybe-not-very-important thing is." He was hardly sputtering, either. He'd only let out three or four extra syllables in there.

The boy, for all his annoying qualities, had the good grace to flinch.

"Yes, sir, well you see, I was patrolling yesterday." Yes, and Rosco had every intention in the world of shadowing him. After church and after the midday meal, figured Enos couldn't get himself into too much trouble when most of the town would be busy worshiping and eating the same as Rosco was. But between his mama and his sister, there had been a meal and a half cooked up, with a roast and potatoes and buttery biscuits that were almost more of a feeling than a taste… Anyway, Rosco had eaten all he could and then eaten some more and then he'd napped and by the time he'd rolled off his mama's couch it was almost time for supper and he'd figured that Enos must be doing all right out there. Gussie at the switchboard hadn't tracked Rosco down to report an emergency, and there hadn't been any sirens. Town looked the same as it ever had through the slight waviness of his mother's front windows, and the kitchen smelled good, so there was no reason he had to check on his deputy after all.

Unless there was.

"And?"

"And I was up on Settler's Ridge." Of course the boy was. It was afforded one of the best angles to view the Duke Farm. Rosco had spent many a recent day up there, but he'd had better reason than his new deputy. Maybe. Hard to say for sure that being sent there by J.D. Hogg was a better reason than going to keep an eye on a pretty girl. Pretty girls were fairly worthwhile things to keep an eye on. "And I saw some activity on the Duke farm."

"What kind of activity, Enos? Like Daisy tending to her garden?" Which she'd do in shorts and a halter top at this time of year, and it was probably worth watching. "Or milking a goat?" which would involve a certain amount of bending, and the girl was young, but she had some nice long legs.

"No, sir, I don't reckon Daisy did much of anything at all. I mean, she was hanging clothes on the line, but that was after. Or before."

Maybe he hadn't trained the boy as well as he thought. (Maybe the boy wasn't trainable at all, but he was eager and willing, and most importantly, cheap.) "Before or after what, Enos?" The words were mean and low and surly, and the fool in front of him finally stopped playing with his hat long enough to answer like a man. Like a deputy reporting to his superior officer.

"Before Bo and Luke Duke went off riding in a big old black Ford sedan."

"In the daytime?" Rosco figured it couldn't have been night, not if Daisy Duke was getting ready to hang out a bunch of laundry. Because no sane woman would be hanging clothes after dark.

"Yes, sir, and they had Alice Snodgrass with them, too."

Well, that was strange. "Wouldn't have been no 'shine run, not in the day."

"No, sir, and that ain't all." That's right, there was an after to follow the before. "It was hours later, maybe three, because I came back to town to check on the bank," which was one of those things that the Sheriff's Department was obligated to do every few hours. "And then I got a sandwich at the Busy Bee Café, roast beef on rye and a pickle—"

"Enos," Rosco interrupted. Because if he let the boy go on, he was going to want to go over to the Busy Bee and get himself a sandwich (or a hotdog, Edna made the tastiest ones in the county) and he hadn't even had a proper breakfast yet. Just the coffee. "What happened back at the Duke farm?"

"Well, like I said, it was maybe three hours later, I was on the ridge again, and Daisy was hanging her laundry and Jesse and Molly Snodgrass were in the farmyard. I ain't sure what they was doing. There was a goat there by Jesse, but he didn't seem to be milking it or nothing—"

"Enos!" Milk with his sandwich sounded good, honestly. But the Busy Bee wouldn't be open for hours and besides, his rookie of a deputy had been telling him something halfway useful.

"Well, I don't know exactly what happened, but all of a sudden, Daisy and Jesse and Molly piled into their pickup trucks and headed off down Old Mill Road like a bunch of scalded cats. I was up on the ridge so I couldn't follow them. Besides, I wasn't sure that I should, what with how they wasn't doing nothing wrong. Nothing I could see anyway. I don't reckon Daisy was doing nothing wrong at all, nor Jesse. Them Duke boys, I don't much figure they were in cahoots with Alice, but they drove off with her willingly enough anyways…"

"Enos," he interrupted again. "Did they ever come back?"

"Yes, sir, I reckon they did but it was mighty late at night. I'd been by the bank again and had my dinner and clocked out at seven like you told me to. But I just couldn't rest easy until I knew that D—them Dukes was all right, so I went back on up there to Settler's Ridge – I took my father's car, sheriff, so you ain't got to worry about the gasoline—"

"Enos." He stood up. It wasn't like he was getting the roster done, anyway. Besides, he had someplace to be, even if just a few moments ago his plans for the morning had been to finish the roster, then pretty much sit still for a while. "What time did they get back?"

"It was after two in the morning."

"All right," Rosco said, and where exactly had his hat gotten to? It wasn't on his desk or over by the door. "Go on home, Enos. You ain't on duty for a bunch of hours yet."

"Yes, sir. But," his hat, he'd come in with it this morning, hadn't he? His hands went to his head to find it bare, but his hair was a mess. Must have had his hat on when he got here, then taken it off and never combed his hair. Of course not, he wasn't expecting to be seen for a while yet.

"Enos, where's my hat?" But by then, he'd spotted it. Over by the coffee pot, which had been his first stop of the morning. To try to make a decent pot himself, but there had been some left over from yesterday, so he'd put the pot on the burner. Even day-old coffee brewed by Enos was better than what Rosco could make on his own.

He hustled over to get his hat.

"There it is," Enos confirmed uselessly. "But Sheriff?"

"What, Enos, can't you see I'm busy?"

"Yes, sir, I can see that."

"Then quit bothering me," he said, and marched across the office with all the intent in the world to go through the swinging doors and not look back. Except that Enos wasn't following after him or in any way making an effort to leave the station and go home. So he turned back. "What, Enos?" he asked and it took every drop of control that he could muster not to shout it.

"It's just that, when them Dukes came back, all of them was crowded into Molly's and Jesse's pickups. They didn't bring that black car back with them. And Molly's and Jesse's cars were so covered in mud that the headlights didn't hardly shine more than a few feet in front of them."

Which meant that for some reason or other, the Dukes had taken a moonshine-running car someplace muddy – like the swamp – and left it there. They were up to something, and Rosco had no idea what. But he had a way to find out.

"Go home Enos," he said, and headed out the door toward the patrol car.

* * *

"Dang it, Bo!"

There was a huff, and then Bo put his hands on his hips. Looked out over the flat of their fields at the mess, then down to the dirt below his feet like he was counting to ten. (Bo wasn't that patient. Three was about as far as he ever got.)

"One little raindrop falls on your parade and you yell at me. Why is that?"

It was more than a raindrop. Even if the skies were clear, what had happened in their cornfield was a lot more like a hurricane than a raindrop.

"If you wasn't so dang pretty, Alice wouldn't be trying to get you alone in the swamp." It wasn't much of an argument, and Luke knew it.

"You just wish you was as pretty as me," should have been accompanied by one of those smiles that outshone the sun, but what limped across Bo's face was barely a smirk.

"I wish you'd talk less and work more." Which wasn't fair, neither of them was working on anything at all. They were just standing along the slight rise of the tree line on the east edge of their cornfield, surveying the mess. "Besides," Luke added, "you was the one that was driving yesterday."

"You figure you could have done better? Anyways, you was the one pushing and you didn't do so great, either."

No, he hadn't, but by the time he was outside the car trying to shove it out of the mud they'd gotten stuck in, Bo had dug them in deep enough that they were halfway to China, anyway. Which hadn't stopped him from digging them in deeper, and hadn't stopped Luke from looking for something to give them traction. Sometime past dusk, after they'd gotten themselves three-quarters of the way to China, and Alice had spent the better part of three hours cowering in the backseat, saying she'd sure feel safer if Bo would come back there and sit with her while Luke stayed outside with the flies because he was covered from his boot soles to the tips of his hair in mud, one of Bo's mayday calls on the CB finally got answered. Daisy, who said she and Jesse were looking for them and funny if Alice didn't stop worrying about her hide for long enough to get on the CB and tell Molly that they were just west of gator's bend (wherever that was). By nightfall they were reunited with their kin, and they all tried to get _Tilly_ out of her hole. But they'd had to leave her where she was, seven-eighths of the way to China, for the rest of the night.

This morning, Jesse had called the garage in town, and Henry Davenport had said he'd send his son over with the wrecker as soon as the fool boy dragged himself in to work. Which meant that somewhere around ten, Jesse, Molly and Cooter had gone off to rescue _Tilly_ , leaving the four kids behind with the admonishment to stay out of trouble. To Luke's ears, that sounded an awful lot like _keep Bo away from Alice_ so he'd taken his younger cousin out into the fields for a pointless check on the crops that turned out not to be so pointless after all.

"You're just mad because I was right about Molly and Alice." Bo's brilliance would stun the academics at all those big, fancy universities. How he managed to be wrong all the time and then every once in a while he'd be so right that it was infuriating.

As a rule, corn didn't change a lot from day to day, at least not in late July. All the same, while the whole Duke family had been off playing hide-and-seek in the swamp with a couple of scoundrels-disguised-as-friends, someone had driven into their corn patch with something small enough to be a motorcycle, and knocked down a good quarter of their stalks in awkward circular patterns.

"Alice was with us and Molly was with Jesse," he reminded Bo. "Which means if they did it, they had to have help."

"Molly's always talking about them nephews of hers."

And yet not saying much of anything at all about them. Like where they lived and why the Dukes had never had occasion to meet them. They were a mysterious bunch (Luke couldn't even swear to know how many there were supposed to be), that was for sure.

"Reckon that's a possibility," Luke said, shielding his eyes against the glare of sunlight through a thin filter of clouds that was giving him a headache. Or maybe the appallingly little sleep he'd gotten last night followed by waking up to this mess was what did it.

"You figure there's another?"

Luke shrugged and turned back toward the house. Took a few steps in that direction and it was only a matter of seconds before Bo was there at his shoulder again, matching his pace.

"What if," Luke asked him, "Molly and J.D. were in cahoots?"

Bo let out a gust of air. "That'd explain a lot."

* * *

The thing was, there wasn't a whole lot that they could really do. Jesse and _Tilly_ had made their way back home by midday, and Cooter was invited to lunch. Seven people at the table was even tighter than six, especially when the extra guest was just as willing as Bo was to reach for seconds (and thirds if there had been any, but of course there wasn't, not with Cooter Davenport at the table). Then again, Cooter made for one more person to buffer him against Alice, and you had to take the bad with the good.

It had been going on midafternoon, with the flies biting, by the time they got Jesse out to the fields. The clouds closing in like heavy curtains in the overhead sky didn't look half as stormy as their uncle's face. Especially when Bo pointed out that the damage to the corn crop had occurred when the whole family was conveniently waylaid by Alice and Molly. Nothing was improved, so far as the old man's disposition was concerned, when Luke threw in the part where their houseguests must have had help, and he suspected they'd teamed up with J.D. Hogg.

"Reckon I'll go back to the house," had a hard edge to it. "And call Rosco to report this to him. You boys," he said, pointing out into the field, "clean up the mess."

Which seemed like a bad idea if it was supposed to be a crime scene, but then again, Rosco knew what a cornfield that had been driven through looked like. He'd done it often enough himself. And the way Jesse's eyebrow cocked up when Bo didn't move fast enough to do as he was told went to prove that today was not the day to discuss logic flaws.

Besides, Luke was already marching out into the field, picking a path between the still-standing stalks. Bo followed after him, managing (but just barely and only by remembering how long it had been before he could sit comfortably after the last time he got whipped) not to shake his head at the ridiculousness of it.

Because there wasn't a whole lot that they could really do. Broken stalks couldn't be made whole again.

Still, he made his own way through the corn until he came to one of the clearings left in the wake of the vandalism, found where broken stalks were leaning on those that were still standing, and tried to separate the two. Moving the dead weight off of what still had a chance to live, slapping at the flies that were trying to eat him alive, hearing Luke do the same not far away from him.

Sweating in the humidity, hair clinging to his forehead and the back of his neck, and then suddenly getting a chill. Hair on his arms standing up, and he turned slowly. Looked behind him and there wasn't much of anything there except more corn. Beyond that there was the same rise that had been there as long as he could remember, where the straggly live oak tree stood, its twisted branches thick with Spanish moss. Then there was the woods that separated this field from Old Mill Road, and all of it looked the same as it ever had. Empty, even if Bo would have sworn someone was watching him from somewhere out there.

"Bo," made him spin in the opposite direction, one hand up to defend his face, the other out to keep his balance. "You all right?" But it was just Luke. Suddenly in the same part of the clearing as Bo, and he'd probably come to scold him for taking a two-second break from his work, to call him lazy and goad him into doing more than his fair share, because Luke thought he was clever that way.

He must have looked spooked or sick or something, because Luke just stared at him with those eyes that were far too pretty for any man to have, especially his rough-edged cousin. Not calling him names, not with his arms across his chest or in that delightfully-grouchy pose that he could strike.

"I'm fine," Bo decided, mopping one arm across his sweaty forehead, and letting the other fall to his side. Because Luke wasn't one to tolerate foolishness, and that's what Bo's feeling had been. There wasn't anyone in the trees watching them, there were just the clouds in the sky and the breeze starting up. A thunderstorm brewing and it'd be here sooner than either of them wanted. Bo slapped a fly off his arm. "Let's just get this done before the sky opens up on us."

Luke eyed him for another couple of seconds, then shrugged and turned away to get back to cleaning up the mess. "Take it easy on your hands," he called back over his shoulder. "Holler if you need help."


	16. A Foul Mood Split Six Ways

**Sixteen: A Foul Mood Split Six Ways**

 _July 30, 1974_

The morning after a rain meant getting up early enough to make sure that the men in the house didn't come tramping back in from chores with their boots still on. It meant cleaning up after them because even if she told them to leave the mud outside, it'd still find its way into spots and splatters along the kitchen floor. It meant listening to Bo grouse about the knots that the humidity tied in his hair, and Luke mocking him for being vain (but shoving his own curls back from his forehead with an utter lack of tolerance). It meant Jesse telling them both to knock it off without any benevolence at all, because mornings after rain twisted his rheumatic fingers just as severely as Bo's hair.

But once the early-dawn stampede through her kitchen was done, Daisy usually loved the morning after a rain. Everything washed clean and smelling fresh, fog rising off the fields, birds singing as they bathed themselves in puddles. She should have enjoyed this morning doubly, but she just couldn't. Too many weird things happening to her family. Not the usual disasters and calamities, just odd harassments here and there, enough to keep them all on edge and sniping at each other. A foul mood split six ways, because Molly and Alice had to get in on everything the Dukes did these days.

Daisy carried that foul mood into town with her. She'd tried to leave it behind, to focus on better things to come, but it'd tucked itself into her brain in exactly the same way she'd tucked napkins into the basket she carried.

It was Tuesday, a day that hadn't ever meant much of anything to her before, but today it was important. Because the sheriff had posted a duty roster, which meant Enos had actual hours he was supposed to work and hours that he had off, and Tuesdays he didn't go in until two in the afternoon. And that left him time for a lunch date with Daisy.

Her preparation time for this date had been brief by normal standards, she supposed, but it was downright lengthy compared to all those unplanned dates they'd had. He'd called her yesterday afternoon – while Bo and Luke and Jesse were out mulling over the vandalism in their corn patch – to say he had part of Tuesday and all of Friday free; would she like to get together? A picnic lunch on the grass of Hazzard Square had been her idea, ice cream afterward had been his.

So she'd set to frying up some chicken, which made the house smell good. Molly and Alice had shown up in the kitchen to see what she was up to, then Molly had gotten the idea to make up some chili for Jesse. Alice got in on it and cut up potatoes for a potato salad, then shredded a cabbage for coleslaw. By the time the three of them were done, there was a feast for last night's meal and a bunch of leftovers for today, too.

Heavy basket in her hand, blanket over her shoulder, drifting across the square in search the driest bit of grass to spread out on – then she squeaked at the sudden tapping on her shoulder.

"Sorry, Daisy," came too fast as she was spinning toward the touch. Toes stepping on toes, balance lost then she was caught by the elbow. Enos, forehead in knots, one hand holding her steady while the other took the basket from her hand and set it safely on the ground. Then he was holding her by both shoulders, warmth of his palms sinking into her flesh, every place he touched like a nerve on fire because it was his skin touching hers in places where it never had before.

It was a picnic, she'd told herself as she put on a pale pink, strappy halter top and the jeans she'd cut the legs off of yesterday. Her own jeans this time instead of Luke's, so they fit nice and close to her body, and she'd spent part of the evening unraveling the fresh-cut edge to leave a fuzzy fringe. She'd found a faded blue bandanna in one of her drawers and rolled it up into a headband to keep her hair – which had achieved that annoying length where it was always in her way – out of her face. Overall she'd decided that the look was kind of hip and kind of funky, and she approved of herself in the mirror. Jesse's feelings on the subject were made known by his frown and the tilt of his head, but he didn't make her go back and change. She figured that Bo's raised eyebrow and broad grin were about as close as she was likely to get to a genuine compliment from any of her kin. She looked good.

Then again, all her efforts were pointless given the way she was glaring at her date, her face twisting as her emotions settled on something like fear, relief and anger all at once.

"Don't scare me like that," she snapped right into his earnest face.

"I'm sorry, Daisy, now I didn't mean to scare you." Hands squeezing her shoulders and somewhere in the middle of the lightning storm of her emotions, a butterfly took quiet wing in her stomach. "Not on purpose."

She leaned in or he did – hard to say which – but the next clear thought in her head was that he smelled good. Like ivory soap, plain but fresh, and then that one butterfly became a thousand swarming in her belly because she was in his arms. Hands rubbing on her back like a third apology, safe and warm. Her own hands were on his back, fingers spread across his shoulder blades like an afterthought, making her wonder if she should rub, too, or if she should stay still and just try to hold onto the moment as long as she could—

And then his arms were opening, his body straightening and so she gave in and did the same. It was only the need to open her eyes that made her realize she'd closed them, her heart throbbing in her ears at the sight of his face, head tilted and eyebrows knitted in concern. For her, about her, in a way that no one ever was or had been before. Sure, Bo and Luke looked out for her, but that was obligation as much as anything. And Jesse worried after her, but he was the closest thing she had to a father now that hers was gone. Other boys she'd known had wanted things from her, wanted her to give everything she had to them, but Enos—Enos thought of her first. How she was feeling, what she wanted, before he even thought of himself. It made her almost dizzy.

Still, she figured she sounded at least partly normal when she told him it wasn't his fault, that she was just easily spooked these days, and then suggested that they find a place to spread the blanket. He'd taken over from there, carrying the basket, picking a spot, helping her set up. Oohing and aahing over the chicken as he ate it, complimenting her lemonade and the bandanna in her hair in the same breath. Keeping the atmosphere charming and normal when her heart had never settled down again and she wasn't sure it ever would. Eating her own meal in nibbles that weren't big enough to fill a chipmunk's cheek, dabbing away at herself with a napkin after every bite, just to be sure she wasn't making a mess. About the only time she relaxed was when Enos dropped some potato salad on his uniform shirt and laughed as she did her best to clean him up.

It was a lousy date, she thought somewhere around the meal's end, and it was all her fault. For being skittish, or for being head-over-heels and unsure of how to act. Enos was kind enough to pretend not to notice, to keep up the chatter as he helped her put away the leftovers, then took the basket from her once again. Tossed the blanket over his shoulder and used his free hand to grab onto hers, leading her across the square.

Dropping off the basket and blanket in the bed of Jesse's pickup, they headed over to Coneiferous for the ice cream they'd promised each other. No line at this time on a weekday, and there was Velma in the little window, looking bored. All the same, she rushed them in taking their orders. Daisy just didn't have the energy to try to be friendly with her again or to remind her of how they'd met on that July Fourth afternoon. It all seemed like years ago, anyway. She simply ordered her cone, waited while Enos did the same, then held them when they came so that Enos could pay for them both. From there it was the walk to the bridge, licking at ice cream all the way, which gave her a great excuse to not talk when she couldn't think of a single thing to say.

"I reckon I understand why you was so nervous, earlier," Enos started when they reached the bridge. Licking around the edges of his cone like Daisy had taught him, so the melting ice cream wouldn't run over his fingers. The sun caught in his hair, sparking up warm golds in what might otherwise be thought of as a dull brown. "The sheriff told me about what happened to your corn crop."

"I gather he told you there weren't no suspects, neither." A fact which had left Jesse stonily silent while Bo shifted on his feet and glared. Not quite at Alice or Molly, but the idea was there. Luke had been the one to complain that Rosco wasn't taking them seriously. The sheriff promised to keep an eye out for a motorcycle with corn stalks caught in its spokes, a solution that had pleased absolutely no one (not even Rosco, it seemed), and then he'd taken his leave.

"Yes, he did." Enos took another lick from his cone, then tossed it off the bridge and into the water. He took her by the shoulders again, squeezing and rubbing all at once. "Now, I don't want you to worry none, Daisy. I mean to protect you and I ain't going to let nothing hurt you, you understand me? I'm a duly sworn law officer, now." And armed when on duty, too.

"But Enos, you can't watch me every minute. And even if you could—" she wouldn't want him to. Not with the family business and all.

"I know I can't, Daisy," he said, and his right hand slid off her shoulder, all the way down the length of her arm, leaving trails of tingles behind it. Taking her free hand, sweeter than the ice cream still melting in her mouth, twining their fingers together and squeezing lightly. "But I ain't never more than a phone call away. If you call me, I'll be there lickety-split. Promise."

* * *

 _This is ridiculous,_ Luke had said. _We ain't even had time to rebuild what got burnt, and if we did, who's to say it won't get burned again? Ain't been able to cook worth a damn, neither._ _Can't hunt because we can't leave Jesse and Daisy, and besides, we ain't even got our own dogs here._ Angry as all heck, but that hadn't lasted long. Not beyond the time it took to shoo the chickens off their pitiful eggs – they weren't laying as well in the shed as they had in the barn – and milk the goats. By the time they were headed into the house after morning chores, Luke had started staring out at nothing, pulling the edge of his lip into his mouth.

Thinking, and that was a dangerous thing.

That was the morning, and by afternoon, there was a smirk playing at the corner of Luke's mouth. No more thinking needed, plan made and the only questions remaining were (what was the plan?) how badly their hind ends would sting when it was all over, and whether they'd be sitting down any time in the next week.

Evening chores, because no one ever followed them out to the barn-that-wasn't for those – that was when the plan got explained to him. And he wondered, maybe, if they shouldn't bring Jesse in on it. Or make sure that the old man at least approved, but he already knew the answer to that. Anyway, he was getting too old to care what Jesse wanted him to do – four days from eighteen, which was the same as being eighteen, which was the same as being grown up – plus, Luke was a trained Marine with plenty of successful missions under his belt. And this one wasn't even particularly complicated, other than one little part. Jesse could find out what they'd done later, depending on whether or not they were successful.

Which was how he found himself waving goodbye to his uncle out the passenger-side window as Luke pulled their pickup out from under the gnarled oak tree in the middle of the farmyard. Heading to the Boar's Nest first, if only to make them honest men, since that had been the pretense under which they'd left the house. Drinking a coke apiece; four days away from eighteen was still officially seventeen, and besides, sobriety was part of the plan. Luke scanned the crowd and Bo did some flirting, the light and airy sort from which it wouldn't be hard to extricate himself.

"J.D.'s here," Luke mumbled to him after Betty Sue had passed by with a wink and long fingers that mussed his hair oh-so-playfully. Bo shrugged back at him because that wasn't anything unusual. It was Tuesday, after all.

"Rosco ain't," he pointed out.

"Don't matter," Luke countered, knocking his shoulder against Bo's and jutting his chin toward the door. Time, apparently, to go.

This was the part Bo figured would get them whipped when Jesse found out. (Because he would find out. He always did.) Not that it mattered, when it was also the best part, the thing he'd been waiting for all summer, even if he hadn't realized it until now. Doing something about everything that had happened to them, instead of arguing over who were the most likely suspects. Even if what he and Luke were about to do was, strictly speaking, not entirely legal. They'd been raised on honesty and fairness, but there were loopholes where the law was concerned.

And once his whipping arm got tired, Jesse would come around to understanding this particular loophole. (Luke would take first licks anyway. He always had.)

They were in town in minutes, the rattle of their pickup truck echoing off the concrete, beaming headlights the only illumination aside from the few streetlights on the square. Even the courthouse was dark, which Luke cheerfully noted aloud. It didn't matter that Rosco wasn't at the Boar's Nest because he wasn't working, either.

"At his mama's," Luke theorized. "For dinner and whatever Coltranes do for entertainment." If J.D. got Lulu most Wednesday nights, seemed like Rosco claimed the family on Tuesdays.

Moonshiner's habit, Luke snuffed the headlights and crept into the alley that ran along the backside of the Hazzard Bank. Killed the shuddering engine and they spent a few seconds letting their ears adjust, listening for footsteps or a car or anything posing greater danger to them than a scampering squirrel.

Only sound Bo could pick up with the pounding of his own heart. Making moonshine in a hidden mountain cove was one thing, but this, what they were about to do, was something else.

Bo wondered, sometimes, about Luke and the things he did without ever showing a lick of fear. He'd been a thorn in Jesse's side for a long stretch, from about the age of twelve until the Marines. Getting into one thing after another and Bo didn't even know the half of what he'd done. (Of course, Bo found his own measure of trouble for a few years there, and even if Luke had been clear across the world at the time, his cousin knew about every single one of them. But only because Bo told him.) When the whip cracked, Luke faced it without cringing, without complaining or begging for leniency. And when it came to what they were doing tonight, Luke was cool as anything. Getting out of the pickup, closing the door with nothing more than a click, then walking toward the buildings – not tiptoeing, but walking the same as he would on a midafternoon stroll – well, Bo had to wonder how Luke did it. Especially when his own pulse just kept right on throbbing in his ears.

 _Thump, thump, thump._

Luke letting himself into J.D. Hogg's office in the Boar's Nest was one thing. He'd led Bo through all of that as part of explaining the plan for tonight. How he'd picked the lock of the office while Bo played with the band. How he'd fished around, coming up with half of nothing much at all. How he'd almost been caught, but he figured that the scribbled map he'd seen was only part of something bigger. And how that something bigger was likely to be found in the records office in the courthouse.

Now, breaking into private property was illegal, and if Luke had been caught it wouldn't have been pretty. But it was just Jefferson Davis Hogg, private citizen, whose space he'd violated. It wasn't the same as breaking into the courthouse.

But that was what they were doing right now. What Luke was doing (or trying to do), anyway. Walking the perimeter, shoving on windows and looking for one that wasn't locked solid. Calmly, like he'd done this same thing every night of his life, and that was why Bo wondered about him. He knew Luke inside and out, and still he couldn't figure out how his cousin could be so cool.

 _Thump, thump, thump._

Bo wasn't sure his heart could take it. Wasn't sure he wanted his heart to take it, thought maybe it would be for the best if Luke never found a way in—

But that was silly, because there it was. The hiss of a windowpane sliding up in its frame, Luke's low chuckle and headshake. Too dark to see much, but Bo knew his gestures well enough.

"Rosco," Luke scolded under his breath. Because of all the windows in the place, the first unlocked one Luke had found belonged to the sheriff's office. Maybe there was another one, they'd only been halfway around the building and this had to be the worst idea Luke had ever had. Or maybe coming out here with Luke was the worst idea Bo had ever had, but it had been exciting to be included. All his life he'd been younger than Luke, tolerated, protected, brought along when it was safe or strictly necessary. This might have been the first time that Luke deemed him a genuine peer, a partner (in crime). "Ya dang fool."

There had to be a better way to do this, but Luke didn't seem to think so. There he went, grunting as he climbed in through the high window like it was a perfectly normal thing to do. Like he did it every day (or night) and there was nothing for Bo to do but follow.

 _Thump, thump, thump._ His nervous system had a few objections to the notion that there was nothing else he could do.

In, and Luke was there to pull him over to the side, out of the thin, yellow glow from the streetlights that ringed Hazzard Square. Closing the window behind them so no concerned citizen would see it yawning open and set up the alarm; that, anyway, went to prove that Luke was at least partially sane.

Tripping over whatever was in Rosco's office – felt like a chair or a stool – making their way into the open space of the squad room. Luke went patting around some of the desks that had once been occupied by a relative swarm of deputies. Doing his best with the available light, opening and closing drawers like they were his own. Like he hadn't just gone and broken _into_ the sheriff's station of all things.

Jesse always said that war did funny things to a man. Luke seemed perfectly normal most of the time, but this, right here, showed an unhealthy absence of fear of consequences.

"Ha!" Luke said, too loud. Far too loud, though it was hardly more than a whisper. Then there was a click and a beam of light shining on Luke's feet. Bo wasn't a scaredy-cat by any stretch, but what Luke was doing seemed an awful lot like stealing from the police. More rummaging around, Luke using one flashlight to find another, handing the second one over to Bo. Seemed foolish to take it when Rosco had their fingerprints on file ten times over, but he did it anyway. Because it was Luke handing it to him, and Luke was reckless, but he was smart.

 _Thump, thump, thump._

At least he hoped Luke was smart.

Out the swinging doors of the sheriff's station and into the main lobby of the building, where they turned off their flashlights again so they wouldn't be seen through the glass doors in front, stumbling around the staircase to that heavy wooden door marked 'Records Office.'

Because, Luke had explained when he'd laid out what they were going to do (without too many details, and that part was all right – Bo might not have wanted to know a whole lot in advance), Cooter had seen J.D. Hogg skulking in two suspicious locations. The library, which Luke had already checked out in a perfectly legal manner and without any help from Bo, and the records office. Hogg had been poking around, looking at archives and deeds to parcels of land, which wasn't all that unusual in and of itself. The man owned a lot of the property in the county. Bought it cheap, sold it expensive, made a bundle off other people's miseries.

But this time, he'd been studying up on Bald Hill. Land that most people thought of as wasteland or no man's land, but part of it had been in Lavinia's family, handed down over generations. It was rightfully Jesse's, as far as the family knew. But there hadn't been any taxes paid on that land in decades, and maybe J.D. figured he could have it for free, or maybe he had some idea of who had once owned it. The original deed, the one Lavinia had brought into her marriage with Jesse, was gone. Burned in the barn fire almost a month ago. But any official records might exist and if they did—

Well, Luke hadn't explained that part. What he planned to do if they found what they were looking for. Bo just hoped it would include sending Molly and Alice back to where they belonged, because he was about through with both of them.

Luke tucked the flashlight under his arm, used his teeth to get his knife blade open, then slid it into the doorjamb. A push and a jiggle and the door swung open. They went through the opening and closed themselves in, turned on the flashlights to pierce the solid blackness. On the far side of the heavy wooden counter, where thin-haired Emery Potter worked most days answering questions and offering out mimeographed copies of yellowing records, there was a door. Luke tried the knob, found it unlocked (of course it was, the lock on the outside door was supposed to keep anyone from getting this far) and offered a gleeful thumbs up. (The fool wasn't just fearless, he was nuts. Having fun while Bo's heart was jackhammering in his chest.) Leading them down the narrow stairs into the mildewed basement storage room, shadows looming everywhere they pointed their flashlight beams.

 _Thump, thump, thump._

File cabinets all along the walls and in rows – musty smell of old papers and damp concrete – and he had no idea what Luke thought they'd find here. Not when there were so many drawers with brown, water-damaged labels on them in tiny print. Mostly just numbers, and what were those. Parcels? Years? The Dewey decimal system? He had no idea, and neither did Luke, who just shrugged and pointed him off to the far corner of the large space – bigger downstairs than up, maybe a quarter of the building's footprint – like if they started at opposite ends they could find whatever they were looking for faster.

"Luke," he whispered in complaint, got a shaken head and another jab of that finger ( _go on, Bo_ ) for his efforts.

Strange hissing echoes of his own footsteps, but he went. Looking at old cabinets and wondering at the labels, pulling on a drawer that stuck, then gave with a moaning squeal that stole the breath right out of his throat. Settling down, flipping through papers – birth certificates, written out in longhand. No one he knew, maybe some that Jesse knew once upon a time – they were old. Fragile and faded.

Closed that drawer, opened another one, lower in that same cabinet. Still birth certificates, still old, and he moved on. Three cabinets to the right (because he didn't want to spend his whole life down here with the rot and cobwebs and records from so long ago that they might as well have been ghosts), he pulled on another drawer. Another squeak and he was looking at even more birth certificates, but they were whiter. Newer, on forms, though the boxes were still filled in with pen. Dated from the early 1930s and he suddenly realized that his father's had to be here somewhere. Luke's father's too, and Jesse's (though that one would be from the nineteen-teens) and he had the urge to look for them. To see evidence that they had existed, that their lives had been worth keeping track of.

He gave himself a mental shake, reminded himself of where he was and why. Looked again at the labels on the filing cabinets, and they were starting to make sense. Everything he'd opened so far was labelled with a 01, then a range of years.

He closed the drawer and moved on, shining his flashlight on the fronts of the drawers until he found one was labeled with a 02. Opened it and found marriage certificates. (His parents' would be in here. But, no. Moving on.)

Rattle and clunk, Luke was making his way through some cabinets of his own at the far end of this space. Bo wondered what his cousin was looking through and whether he felt the same temptations to look for something, anything at all, about their parents. Just a piece of paper that they might have touched once, something (other than the tombstones up in the old cemetery) that had their names printed on it.

Double checking, another drawer labeled 02, and it was still marriage certificates, so he moved on to the 03s. Death certificates. He all but slammed that drawer, scolded himself for the noise. But of all the things he wanted to find in here, his parents' death certificates were at the bottom of the list.

"Luke," he whispered, intent on explaining the code he was still working to break.

Rattle and skitter, coming from the wrong direction. Behind him when Luke was in front somewhere, and—

"Shh." That came from where Luke was, then nothing but stillness.

 _Thump, thump, thump._

But it was only his heart, nothing that could be heard beyond his own ears. At least he thought not, but then again, were those footsteps? The fine hair on his arms and the back of his neck went up; a million antennae feeling searching the air for danger. He turned slowly and had to bite back a holler when he found a warm body next to his. Luke, who had moved silently to his side. His hand coming up to Bo's shoulder with a squeeze of apology for scaring the heck out of him.

They stood like that for a small eternity, waiting for Bo's heart to settle or the noise to come again, but neither quite happened. Eventually Bo just let out a huff of air and Luke patted him before turning as though he was going to go back from where he came.

"Luke," Bo whispered again. "It's a code. Zero-one is birth cer—"

Rattle and _slap!_ , coming from that same corner, sending Bo's stomach flying and the bass drum of his heart taking off at breakneck speeds. Luke's hand on him, gripping hard around his elbow and pulling him down. Squatting low and listening, but after the too-loud clicks of their flashlights turning off, there was nothing. Not a squeak or a peep. The air was too close; either they were caught or they weren't and there wasn't anywhere they could hide if they were…

Bo flipped his flashlight on again and trained it toward the corner in question. Must have been an okay idea, because Luke did the same thing. Nothing but concrete walls and looming shadows. They scuttled a bit to get closer, and Luke saw it first. Must have, he took in a breath that was half surprise and half a laugh and then Bo saw it, too. Mousetrap, slammed over its poor victim's little neck. It wasn't anything pretty to see, but it meant they were safe, at least. Or fools.

Back up on their feet, pretending neither of them had really been scared by anything so silly as a doomed rodent scratching around for a morsel in a corner. They were each headed back toward their respective ends of the room, when Bo called Luke back to him. Explained what he'd figured out about the numbering system and by some sort of silent consent, they stuck together after that.

Checking 04 (driver's licenses, and again, he half wanted to search through to find his father's) followed by 05 (vehicle registrations) and 06 (voter registrations). That brought them to the end of the first row of filing cabinets and they were bickering in hushed tones over whether to head to the far end of the next row for the 07s, or go for the closer 09s (Luke was right in the middle of calling him lazy, and he was getting ready to retort that Luke was too stubborn) when there was no mistaking the noise.

 _Thump, thump, thump._ Not just in his chest, this time.

And then overhead lights popped on, blinding them like a pair of moles caught in a tunnel, nowhere to go, nothing they could see and then it was—

"All right boys. Get your hands up and freeze right where you are."


	17. Cuffed and Stuffed

**Seventeen: Cuffed and Stuffed**

 _July 30, 1974_

Well. He'd be a horny toad. It was almost enough to make a man seek out the immediate presence of one Jefferson Davis Hogg and deliver the good news. (Almost, not quite. He figured tomorrow would be soon enough to see the man. Besides, there was nothing wrong with taking a little time to figure out how to make himself look good in the telling of the news.)

His rookie deputy had caught the Duke boys, red handed, breaking and entering (and otherwise sullying) the courthouse.

"We ain't broke nothing," Bo Duke had insisted from between the bars.

"My hands ain't red," Luke had added, showing his palms.

But it didn't matter how much they sassed, those sweaty sodbusters were caged. Right there in the upstairs cell in the squad room. And Enos Strate, who was standing far too close to Rosco while doing his own heavy perspiring, had put them in there. All by himself.

(But see, it wouldn't do to tell it to Hogg quite that way. Maybe something more along the lines of how Rosco had hired and trained the kid that had done the arresting.)

At first Rosco had been calling Enos all manner of names for having tracked him down, off-duty, at his mother's dinner table (which was serving as more of a late-night-snack table at the time) to say he needed help back at the courthouse. But the scolding had been Enos' own fault. He had been yammering on about possums and gumbushes and squealing like he was snake-bit and frothing at the mouth. It took a while to find the patience to tell him to just calm down, and then it took Enos a while to actually do it, and then there were those words: Bo and Luke, records office, sneaking around, caught them, locked them up.

The Duke boys had been cuffed and stuffed.

Enos' first arrest, and Rosco hadn't gotten that far along in training him. But by now it was mighty close to midnight and he didn't want to spend all night here at the courthouse, teaching the boy the ropes.

(Needed some sleep so he could figure out exactly how to express tonight's events to J.D. Hogg. Maybe he'd just announce that the sheriff's department had made the prize bust and leave out the particulars.)

"Just fill out the form," he was explaining to Enos, pointing at the typewriter with the stack of triplicate forms next to it. Could be faulty advice when the boy was known to overthink that kind of thing. Wanting to write words where ten-codes would do fine, but if Rosco went over it with him, line by line, and argued the merits of the precise words, he'd be getting home to bed sometime next week. "I've already got their fingerprints," and Luke Duke's sarcastic eyebrow found that quite interesting. But he did, he even had fairly recent fingerprints of both boys, having arrested them earlier this month. "And their pictures," he added, couldn't help but let out a little _kyu_ of a giggle after that. Oh, telling Hogg about this was going to be fun. Enos sighed out whatever nerves or regrets he had, and headed over to the desk to do as he was told.

(Shoot, he might as well go straight out for saying he'd been responsible for the bust. J.D. was a busy man who didn't care about picayune details anyway.)

"What about our phone call?" Luke Duke jumped right on in. Where he wasn't invited, but wasn't that just like a Duke?

"Yeah, we're entitled to one phone call," Bo echoed, and that was just like a Duke, too.

Enos quit right in the middle of rolling the incident form into the typewriter. It was amazing that the boy had managed to catch those Dukes, honestly. And made up his mind to herd them up the stairs and into the jail at gunpoint when he was so conflicted about everything that had happened since. Prone to being swayed by the prisoners' complaints and orders – like they had any right to be telling a lawman what to do under the current circumstances – and unsure of himself.

"You process them first, Enos, then you let them make that call." Rosco went looking for his hat, then remembered he hadn't come with one. He wasn't in uniform because he wasn't on duty, and he didn't plan on being here any longer than he already had been. The taste of his mama's chocolate cake was old and nearly rancid on his tongue; he needed to get back and cut himself a slice of the hair of the dog.

"Yes, sir," Enos answered, licking his lips in the sort of nervous gesture that just wasn't befitting an officer of the law. The kid was apparently good enough to bring in the Dukes, but Rosco wasn't entirely sure he was good enough to keep them.

All the same. That cake wouldn't eat itself. (If he wasn't quick about it, Lulu would most likely eat it for him.) Rosco was _not_ planning to stay here tonight.

"You process them," Rosco repeated, giving up on finding the hat he didn't have and leaning over to the barren desk that used to belong to Deputy Miller before the previous round of deputies had been canned, and wrapping his hand around the cold plastic of the telephone there. It was heavy and let out a little jingle of protest when he hefted it, but the cord was plenty long, so he moved it over to one of the rolling chairs. "Then you keep them in there and you roll this phone right up to them so they can make their call. From behind them bars Enos, not in front."

"Rosco," Bo protested, or maybe Luke. He wasn't looking at them because he was watching Enos' face for acknowledgement that he's been understood. Got a nod, but those wrinkles on the deputy's forehead didn't seem too sure.

"All right, Sheriff," sounded unsure as the wrinkles looked. The lip biting that followed was even less sure than that.

"You keep your eye on them all night, and don't you even go near their cell." Because Dukes were sneaky. And long-armed, and if Enos got too close, they'd probably grab him. Maybe go for his guns (no, they wouldn't do that, they were sneaky but not mean or dangerous – not mostly, anyway) or his keys or his handcuffs, and make a mess of this whole thing.

"Yes, sir." Oh, but those eyes were near as big as dinner plates. "I just reckon their family's worried about them. Ain't it okay if I let them make their phone call first?"

Hadn't they already been over this? He'd been perfectly clear in his instructions. And his mama's cake was sweet and delicious and probably almost gone by now.

"No, it ain't okay if you let them make their phone call first. Enos," it was late, his eyes were sore and tired, he was in jeans and a flannel shirt when all he wanted was to be in pajamas. "Just do what I said." He shuffled over to the typewriter desk and cranked the form in a little more, just to make his point clear.

He'd already told J.D. Hogg what Enos had seen when he was watching over the Duke farm a couple of days back – the odd comings and goings. Oh, he'd left Enos' name out of the discussion. Just said it all careful-like about what had been seen and when and where, and let J.D. draw his own conclusions about who had done the seeing. Not that it had mattered, because there were no congratulations forthcoming. Just a lot of 'I told you sos' and smugness, followed by questions about what, exactly, he planned to do about it. Rosco only had until morning to figure out exactly how to report the Duke boys' arrest so that it favored him most. He needed to get back to his mother's place and fill his belly and snooze so he could think right.

"I'll be back by eight, Enos. You just do what I said and you don't take your eyes off them all night long. Don't let them hoodwink you."

"Yes, sir," the deputy said. Rosco checked for his hat again (remembered that it wasn't here again) and headed toward the door, while Enos settled himself on the squeaky chair and got serious about doing his job. Forehead shiny and wrinkled, he pounded down a key, then looked up at the jail cell. Bead of sweat on his temple that he wiped away. Pounded down another key and looked again.

Because he was an earnest boy with clear instructions and he was going to follow them to the letter.

* * *

 _July 31, 1974_

In her dream, Enos was there, smiling at her. Beyond the curve of his cheek, there was green. Maybe the grass in the middle of Hazzard Square or maybe down by the pond. She had a sense of floating, so maybe they were in a boat, and the green was the trees reflecting on the water's surface. Didn't matter, Enos was there.

It was a good dream, one where everything felt right. Enos was in that plaid shirt she'd first seen him in back in the high school parking lot, the one that pulled out all the autumn-like flecks of color in his eyes and left them warm and gentle. His head was tipped to the side, his grin was loose and happy, and she got ready to be kissed. But there was something in his hand, something red, something he was trying to give her. A rose, maybe? But not, she saw when his hand came closer, on a stem. _How sweet_ , she thought, _no thorns_. Except it kept getting closer, like he was going to mash it into her face, and then she realized it was a strawberry. Out of season, and where had he gotten it? But it was a good dream, so it didn't matter. The only important thing was that Enos had found it for her, was offering it to her. Was about to put it right into her mouth when: _Crack!_

That was a problem; boats shouldn't crack. Or thud, or rock, sway, flip over fast enough to make her dizzy. Stomach churning, under the water, the layer of lily pads greener than the green trees, sinking in the warm liquid and though she knew she shouldn't, she sucked in a breath…

"Boys!" was what finally shook her from the green depths of her sleep into the pitch-black of her bedroom. Jesse hollering – hollering? Into the night – for Bo and Luke. Which meant trouble, meant there was some reason he needed his young, strong nephews, and she was on her feet. Running, barking her shin on a hard surface, stumbling, hand down for balance, catching on something soft and and warm.

"Oof," someone said. (Alice, that was Alice. Alice in Daisy's bed, she'd tripped over her own bed because there were two guests staying there while she'd been on the floor on a pile of blankets and Bo's sleeping bag. Which meant the door was left, not right.)

"Uncle Jesse?" she called. She'd meant to be out there by now, meant to be helping him, but she'd gotten lost in her own room.

"Land sakes, child," came a scold in a low rasp. "You holler loud enough to wake the dead."

Or just the guests, which was rude, but she couldn't care a whole lot; just needed to get her foot untangled from the blanket it was caught in, needed to get turned around and headed for the door.

"Git!" came from the living room or the kitchen, and she quit worrying about the bed, about Alice or Molly (and the creaking springs went to prove that they were sitting up or rolling off or something, anyway), her barked shin or the blanket that was doing its best to trip her. She shoved herself forward, to her door, pulled it open. Hollered in frustration when it smacked into her foot, went through it.

Hallway, just as dark as her bedroom. Hands out to find the walls, then there was a flash, and _blam!_

"Uncle Jesse?" That was his old flintlock, had to be. If it wasn't it was something else, something worse, some other firearm in someone else's hands—

 _Blam!_

Maudine, off in her temporary home, whinnied a complaint about the noise.

"Git!" hollered again went to prove that even if someone was shooting at Uncle Jesse, he was still alive.

Hand feeling along the wall, running toward the sound until she came to the living room with its frilly curtains and the light of an almost full moon shining through. From there to the gun-powdery kitchen in no time at all.

"Uncle Jesse!" He was there, on his feet, the white of his hair and his long nightshirt showing in the moonlight. "What is it?"

"Some varmints in the kitchen," he growled, staring out through the open door, over the porch and off toward the paddock and the fields beyond. Holding his gun and Daisy sheltered herself behind his warm solidness, peering around his width to see what he was looking at. "Two legged varmints," he added. "Reckon they won't be back soon."

No, they were running off. Two of them, as far as Daisy could see. Men, she figured, from their shapes and sizes, and one of them was limping. Or running funny, anyway, one leg turning at an odd angle as he went.

"Did you shoot him?"

Her uncle turned then, away from the scampering burglars and back to her. "No, I didn't shoot him. I wasn't even aiming at them." He put the safety lock on the rifle, stood it on its butt by the door.

"What's going on?" That was Alice, coming through the arch from the living room. Yawning and scratching at her straw-like hair. Like she thought maybe Jesse and Daisy were snacking on warm milk and cookies and forgot to invite her. Molly was behind her, a little more alert.

"What happened, Jess?"

Her uncle waved his hand through the air in frustration. "Some dang fools thought they'd ransack our kitchen, is all."

Daisy looked around. Nothing but moonlight to see by, but she could still tell that the kitchen table was shoved out of position, one of the chairs was on its side and another was missing altogether.

"They steal anything?" Molly asked.

The whites of Jesse's eyes gleamed in the moon's glow – he was probably rolling them in frustration. "Ain't much of nothing to steal," he scolded. "I reckon you know that as well as I do."

Still, Daisy figured it would be a good idea to turn on the lights and get a better look. She started to cross the kitchen, and then remembered the word that had interrupted her dreams, and the reason she was even awake.

"Where's Bo and Luke?" They'd gone out before she'd gone to bed, but they should have been home by now, shouldn't they? What time was it anyway?

"Boys!" Jesse hollered, the same as he had earlier. Started shuffling in his deceptively quick way toward the opening to the living room, calling the two of them by name.

That was when the phone rang.

* * *

"Enos," Luke was saying, in that voice: Marine sergeant commanding his troops. "We got a right to make that phone call before either one of us dies of old age." Or before they melted into a puddle in the hot, airless cell.

"I know that, Luke, and I promise, I'll let you make it as soon as I do what the sheriff said." Head down in serious concentration, then: _peck!_ He found his next letter.

Bo wasn't too sure why Luke was in such an all-fired hurry to rouse their ill-tempered uncle from his sleep, anyway. They would be spending the night here one way or the other, and getting yelled at could wait until morning, as far as he was concerned. Heck, it could all wait, because after the yelling came the whipping, and even if he was just about eighteen and too old to be whipped now, Bo figured Jesse might not see it that way.

He wondered whether he'd get a last meal, first. The cell smelled vaguely of old pizza, and he figured maybe he'd prevail upon Enos to go find them one. Seemed unlikely to work, when Enos would have to go all the way to Atlanta to find a pizza at this hour, and he'd been quite earnestly heeding Rosco's instructions about never taking his eyes off the jail cell.

"Almost done," Enos promised, staring at the keys in front of him, tongue at the corner of his mouth as he found the one he wanted, then pounded it down with an echoing _peck!_ Luke sat there the whole time on the end of the cot, his hands wrapped around the bars in anticipation. Bo was content to sit behind him, at a ninety-degree angle, and leaning back against the wall. Thinking.

Last time they'd been here, it hadn't been their faults. This time—

"Done," Enos, announced, rolling the triplicate form out of the typewriter with a flourish of glee. He got up with a bounce, put the form in a basket on one of the desks, then hustled over to the chair on which Rosco had left the phone. As if he wasn't tired, and he should be. It had to be almost two in the morning. "But, Luke, Bo, can't you tell me why you done it?" All the joy of having completed his report sagged out of him, his forehead wrinkled around his confused eyebrows. "I mean…"

"Enos," Luke was out of patience. Heck, patience was a dim memory from 1965, as far as Luke was concerned. Now he was fully on his way to surly, mean, dangerous. "We ain't saying nothing to you without our lawyer present."

This time they were guilty of exactly what they were being charged with.

"But, Luke, we was—" _raised together_. That's where Enos was going; he'd been there a few times tonight already. Not understanding how two boys raised so right could go so wrong. (Bo mostly blamed Luke.)

"And now you're a lawman."

Enos sighed, looked away. Then he looked back, offered up a brave nod that was a lot closer to sad. Steely breath, and he shoved the chair forward toward the bars, stepping away as though he could give them privacy when he was sworn to watch them every second. Luke ignored their friend's token gesture and grabbed the phone like it was a morsel of food after a forty day famine. Put the handset up to his ear, then pulled it slightly away.

"Get over here, Bo."

Right, that was how it worked. They faced trouble shoulder to shoulder (even if it was mostly Luke's fault, most of the time) and took their lumps together. So he slid closer. Maybe an eighth of an inch, but he was closer.

Luke snorted. "He ain't going to whip you through the phone," his courageous cousin informed him, but Bo was content exactly where he was, so he just shrugged, and Luke dialed zero. A seemingly endless series of clicks as the rotary went around, a short discussion with the night operator, Gussie, and then he was being put through. Bo might have been mistaken, but he thought Luke was just the slightest bit pale, and his Adam's apple bobbed in anticipation of the call getting answered.

But even from where he was, a clear foot away, Bo could hear that it was Daisy who answered the phone, and on the first ring, too. Luke asked her to put Jesse on, but she started hollering instead. Which made Luke stop holding the phone out and put it right up to his ear, effectively cutting Bo off from hearing. Which he ought to be grateful for, but—

"Daisy, Daisy, whoa. Slow down. You what?" But Luke was getting loud. Or worked up, and Luke almost never got worked up. "Who? What do you mean you don't—" Something was wrong, something worse than them being in jail. Luke's shoulders were hunched with tense muscle. "Is everyone all right?" Now that was just a plain old bad question. Bo leaned closer.

"Luke?" he said. "What's going on?" But he got waved off like he didn't matter, or his question wasn't important, when it dang well was.

Even Enos knew that. Just look at how he'd reversed his direction to come close to the bars, how he was studying and fussing with his own fingers and not even pretending to be doing anything other than what he was doing: eavesdropping on Luke's call.

Bo shuffled close enough to feel Luke's heat, but his cousin didn't offer to let him listen in. All he could hear was the pitch of Daisy's voice, which was two shades past upset and well-nigh on towards hysterical.

"Me and Bo's—we can't come home right now… no, Daisy, I ain't… just… we'll be there as soon as we can be… don't… Daisy! Daisy?" Luke pulled the receiver away from his ear and looked at it like he could see down through the lines all the way back to home. "She hung up," he said with some measure of amazement. As if Luke Duke had never been hung up on by a girl before, but Bo knew full well that he had, more than a few times.

"Enos," Bo said, because he didn't know what Daisy had said to Luke, but he knew the sound of trouble when he heard it. "You got to let us out of here."

Enos let his hands fall to his sides. "Now, you boys know I can't do that." But he didn't sound entirely convinced.

"Enos," Bo tried again, on his feet and not clear how or when he'd gotten that way. Stepping closer to the bars, which made Enos step back. Rosco had told him to look out for any tricks, after all. "Please. Something's happened. Luke, what happened?"

"Someone broke in," Luke said. The bell inside the phone jingled a bit when Luke stopped staring at the receiver and hung it up.

"Into the house?" Bo's voice cracked at the end of that question. "Our house?"

"Into our house," Luke echoed, still sitting, still staring dumbly at the phone. Thinking, no doubt, and this was no time for that sort of pointlessness. This was a time to do something. They needed out of here, and now.

"Enos, you got to let us out."

"I can't do that, Bo." Their friend's tone all but pleaded with them to understand. But there was nothing to understand, other than that Jesse and Daisy were in trouble.

"Enos," Luke said, hauling himself to his feet. Hands gripping the bars, like if he were strong enough, he could bend them and escape. "If you can't let us go, you got to go to the farm. You're the law, after all." Enos was biting his lip, looking from one to the other of them. "We'll be model prisoners while you're gone. We won't even try to escape."

It was sincere, or as sincere as it could be, under the circumstances. Right now, in this minute, Luke wasn't planning on trying to break out of jail. But if Enos went like he was asked to, Bo didn't figure there was anything Luke wouldn't do to try to get the two of them free.

Enos must have figured about the same as Bo did.

"I can't," he repeated, wrinkles making waves across his forehead.

"Enos, you can't leave them there, defenseless," Luke explained. "They're okay for now, but what if whoever it was comes back? Jesse ain't as young as he used to be and Daisy, well, who knows what they might do to her."

Enos' eyes popped wide at that thought.

"Enos, she just hung up on me. For all I know, whoever it was that broke in is already back there. You got to—"

"I can't," Enos said again, but it sounded different this time. Not so much defeat as—and there was almost a smile on his face. "But I know someone who can."

So he marched up to grab the telephone, taking it over to a desk and dialing it. Asked for the Coltrane residence.

"Great," Bo informed Luke. "He's sending Rosco."

"Better than nobody," Luke informed him.

Bo wasn't so sure about that.


	18. Three Squares and a Cot

**Eighteen: Three Squares and a Cot**

 _July 31, 2015_

He had, it occurred to him somewhere between the first nerve-jangling ring of the phone and the second, grown entirely too used to sleeping through the night. After Bessie Mae had left him, after he'd given up on catching every criminal and protecting every constituent, he'd taken to going home. Or going to his mother and sister's place, and either way, he'd get in bed – or take up space on his mother's couch – somewhere around midnight and not move until seven in the morning. He'd been a good and dedicated cop for years and at first he hadn't known how to let go. But once he'd figured it out, he'd embraced it fully and gotten used to it in no time at all.

Which was why he'd yelled at Gussie first and Enos second when he answered the phone. Which he'd only done to keep his mother and sister from being roused by the infernal noise. Enos was just an overanxious youngster who was too eager and earnest to make it through one night of babysitting fairly tame criminals (if Rosco was honest with himself) without having to rouse his superior officer. What had he hired the fool boy for in the first place?

(But Enos had caught the Duke boys doing something genuinely illegal. Rosco had to give him that.)

Rosco finally reassured a nearly frantic Enos that he would take care of whatever had happened at the Duke farm, and that yes, the boy had done good. And reminded him to stay put no matter what, because Enos was young and inexperienced and easily swayed by other youngsters that had been his childhood friends. Tricked, almost without effort.

And that's all this was: a trick. The entire Duke family creating distractions and wild goose chases. So Rosco took his sweet time getting to his feet, hunting up his button-down shirt to go over his white undershirt, pulling his pants up over his shorts. Sitting on the edge of his mother's couch figuring out if he really was as awake as he needed to be when the phone started its confounded shrieking again. He hustled to get it before the second ring, and there was Gussie, telling him that it was the Duke farm calling. He sighed, looked down at his socked feet, and told her to go ahead and put them through. Heard the click and the hiss of an open line, and—

"All right you Dukes," he started, figured he'd do best to take control right here and now. To tell them he'd respond when he darn well felt like it and not before. "I know what you're up to."

"Up to?" And there was sweet Daisy Duke's voice coming back at him in all manner of confusion. Nervous and upset and worried. Then again, she was an actress. At least, he figured she was. They all were, those Dukes. You had to be if you were going to run moonshine in northern Georgia. If you were going to talk nonsense to revenuers, and maybe Daisy hadn't ever had cause to do that. But she was from Duke stock and they were, all of them from as far back as Rosco could remember, actors and schemers.

"No good, that's what you're up to." Important to say that, to let her know that even if she was playing at innocent and scared, he knew it was all a ruse. A game that he didn't intend to lose.

"Sheriff," wasn't a rebuke. She didn't scold him outright, and maybe that was worse than if she had. "We've been robbed."

"Tiddly-tuddly." That was something his mother used to say to him when back when he was walking around in short pants and wiping his nose on his sleeve. Complaining of being too sick to go to school, and she'd stick her hand on his forehead. If it didn't meet her standards of undue warmth, she'd say her tiddly-tuddlies and send him off anyway. No fever meant nothing worth complaining about, and Rosco couldn't touch her from here, but he'd bet his entire paycheck (which wasn't what it used to be) that Daisy Duke didn't exactly have a fever right now. What she had was instructions to do whatever it took to get the law away from the courthouse. (But he was already away from the courthouse, and he was getting ready to head out to the Duke farm anyway, so why was she calling now? To slow him down? Why would she need to do that? What were those Dukes up to?)

It was somewhere in the middle of that long train of thought that Jesse Duke must have taken the phone from his niece, because suddenly there was a gruff, agitated voice, barking in his ear. Telling him to quit stalling, to get on his feet (when he already was, so there was no reason to yell at him about that) and get over there, now. They had a crime to report, and they needed a lawman to take their complaint.

He hung up the phone, picked up his boots on the way out the door, got all the way downstairs and next to his mother's car before he even thought to put them on. Got in, flipped down the sun visor so the keys would fall into his hand. Dumb as it was to leave the keys in the car, his mother always did it anyway, mewling something about how no one would dare steal her car when she was the mother of the town's most powerful man. (Powerful, indeed. If he'd been powerful, he'd still have a passel of experienced deputies instead of one damn fool who (had caught the Duke boys) could hardly be trusted to do one simple thing.) He considered going to town first to trade in his mother's car for the cruiser, figured it was just the Dukes, and they didn't need formalities.

Figured he didn't need an earache from getting yelled at by Jesse Duke for how long it had taken him to get there.

His mama's car wasn't fast, but it wasn't slow, it was just a plain old jalopy without a siren or flashing lights. Hardly worth driving much of anywhere, but it got him to the Duke farm just fine, got him into their driveway and from there it was just a few steps to their lit-up house. Glowing from the inside like some kind of broken down jack-o-lantern in the middle of summer. Knocking on the door was less than pointless when he could hear voices coming from inside, sounding busy, sounding urgent, so he let himself in. Found the whole bunch of them – Jesse, Daisy and Molly Snodgrass – huddled around the Dukes' living room couch. Molly was shouting and Jesse was grumbling. Daisy was squatting in front of the couch, her head cranking back and forth. Just watching the argument like it was a tennis match, and every last one of them was wearing far too few clothes. And completely ignoring the duly constituted law of the land.

Which left him wondering why they'd bothered getting him up off his mother's couch, if they were just going to stand around and yell at their own.

Smell of pork chops still lingering around the house from whenever dinner was, and Rosco figured that if they were going to ignore him, maybe he'd hunt up whatever leftovers there might have been. It would be a fitting payment for his troubles. Especially since there hadn't been a morsel of chocolate cake left when he got back to his mothers' house after jailing those other Dukes.

"There you are," the senior Duke snapped when he finally realized that there was a sheriff in his kitchen. He came stalking across the floor in a fast waddle, finger pointing like he had the same right scold Rosco as the unruly brood of kids he'd raised.

"What's that?" Rosco asked him, head tilting back toward where Jesse had come from. Where now was visible, between Molly at one end of the couch and Daisy at the other, a lumpy something or other that looked an awful lot like a body. "You shoot the intruder?"

"I didn't shoot nobody," Jesse shot back at him, as though he should have known better. And he did, he knew that Dukes were scammers, but they weren't killers. Still, the accusation slowed the man down, made him stop coming at Rosco like he meant to give him all kinds of trouble. "That's just Alice."

"Alice?" Rosco looked back over there to see that Molly was down on a knee now, talking softly to the lump on the couch, while Daisy patted at it with a cloth. "She get hurt in the robbery?" Or whatever shenanigans the Dukes had pulled here tonight.

"No," Jesse answered, with a roll of his eyes that was utterly befitting a frustrated four-year-old. "She keeps fainting. Daisy and Molly," he said a little louder, with a firm look at the two women in question, "can see to her."

Daisy, at least, glanced up at him and nodded at the obvious instructions to stay put. Rosco noticed no similar agreement to behave was forthcoming from Molly Snodgrass.

He got led back through the fine-smelling kitchen all the same (pork chops mixed with gunpowder, when Rosco sniffed more closely), then out to the porch that faced back toward the Dukes' growing-fields. It was more enclosed than not, and even at closing in on four in the morning, it was sweaty out here. (But then it was July in Georgia – it was sweaty any and everywhere.)

"What took you so dang long, Rosco?" Jesse griped, his hands digging at his nightshirt like he was looking for pockets to dig into and pull out a watch or a hankie.

"All right, Jesse Duke." It was important to remind the man who was in charge here. "What are you Dukes up to this time?"

For a moment, and only that long, Jesse resembled his older nephew. Mad as hell and on the edge of lashing out with a fist or a razor-sharp tongue. Ready to state his angry little case with fingers pointing and voice rising, but he didn't. Held himself still long enough to count to ten forwards and back again, then he opened his mouth.

"I ain't sure who it was," he started, indignant as anything, but controlled. That was the benefit of age, maybe. "But there was at least three men in here. Come right in the house in the middle of the night, and they was messing around in the kitchen." Well, of course they were. It smelled good in there. "They ain't got nothing but—" hesitation there so short that a less astute man might not have noticed, but Rosco was a highly trained law-enforcement officer. "They ain't got nothing of value, but they got into things. Like, important papers."

"In your kitchen?" That was as preposterous as the rest of it. The Dukes were schemers and liars. (Except that he couldn't remember a single time that Jesse Duke had ever lied to him outright.) Rosco went to rest his hands on his revolvers and remembered that he was in civilian clothes. Off duty, standing around on a man's porch, smelling the remnants of his dinner and not even getting offered a morsel.

"We got places in there where we hide things," Jesse growled back at him. "And don't you ask me exactly where, because I don't reckon you need to know exactly where they was, just that the thieves," imaginary as they might have been. "Got into them. And then there's that other thing."

"Other thing?" Imaginary murderers, no doubt. Because that was the only thing worse that imaginary thieves.

"Bo and Luke ain't home. They went out last night and Luke knows I ain't waiting up for him, but that I expect him home before midnight. He's good about that, especially when he's got Bo with him. But they ain't never made it home."

Oh, that was priceless. Not imaginary murderers, imaginary kidnappers! Leave it to Jesse Duke to concoct a story like that when he knew full well where his nephews were.

"But they called a little while ago," Jesse continued. "Daisy told them they needed to come home, that the house had been broken into. And all they said was that they couldn't come home right now. She hung up too fast to find out why, and they ain't called back. Can't raise them on the CB, neither."

Rosco laughed. Or meant to, but it came out higher than he might have intended, a little closer to a titter.

"Something funny?" Jesse asked him, and there it was again. Shades of Luke Duke and his half-dangerous temper.

"Them boys of yours are fine, Jesse," he answered, a few more wanton sounds (giggles, if he was being honest) escaped the warmth of his mouth along with the words. "They're being well taken care of. Three squares and a cot."

"Jail?" Jesse roared. Interesting how quickly he jumped to exactly the right conclusion. Didn't even sound exactly surprised about it, either. Just incensed. "You arrested my boys?"

"Yep," Rosco said, not bothering to correct Jesse's mistake about who had done the arresting. Practice for talking J.D. Hogg tomorrow. (Later today, he mentally corrected.) "Because while you was here staging this here 'robbery,' them boys was pulling the real thing at the courthouse. And funny thing if they didn't get caught. I reckon that what Daisy hung up on was their one phone call."

Jesse started hollering and blustering at him. Words and more words that were too loud and came too fast to make complete sense of, but it all came down to how Rosco wasn't welcome in the Dukes' home anymore.

Which was fine with him. He took his leave and figured that if he hadn't gotten any pork chops, at least he'd get a few hours of sleep before his work shift in the morning.

* * *

Hell had no fury like a woman… well, a furious woman.

Things were about to get ugly. Or they'd been ugly for hours now – it had been a long night after all, without sleep and with plenty of discomfort – and now things were about to get hostile.

Ugly was Luke pacing around after they'd made that call to Daisy and learned that the family home had been – what? Robbed? Or just invaded? They didn't know which and they didn't know whether anyone had been hurt, and why had she hung up on him?

Ugly was Bo begging Enos to let them out, over and over again, even though it wasn't getting him anywhere. Trying to wear him down, maybe, and it hadn't worked because Enos wasn't a girl, and it was only the girls that couldn't resist Bo's begging.

Ugly was Bo's head dipping in defeat when he sat down next to Luke on the cot after pestering Enos for far too long. Ugly was how, when Luke put an arm around his cousin, it didn't change his resigned posture one bit. Ugly was Luke half wishing Enos was in there with them so he could put his other arm around their old friend. If it was possible, Enos looked more miserable than Bo. Ugly was watching Enos pull at his fingers, then when that got to be too much (or not enough) pulling off his silly deputy hat and fiddling with the tassels.

Ugly was the way Bo stayed quiet and still for far too long, then started to shift a little on the cot. Ugly was how he started in on Enos again, this time asking to be taken to the bathroom. Ugly was realizing that Bo was quite serious – he needed the bathroom, and he wasn't willing to use the urinal in the cell, not in front of Enos. And Enos was under instructions to watch them every second. Not so ugly was realizing that part of what made Bo so particular about the situation was that he had never been in the military and hadn't had to get over that sort of squeamishness. Ugly was trying to figure out a way to let Bo have imagined privacy while Enos kept his word to Rosco about watching them at all times. (The solution was for Luke to stand there and block most of Enos' view, and for Bo to hold his left hand out to the side so Enos could watch that it never tried, even once, to escape all on its own.)

Ugly was spending the rest of the night staring at Enos as Enos stared at them, and waiting for any word at all from Rosco. Ugly was the still air of the jail cell and the heat of Bo leaning up against his side. Resting his head on Luke's shoulder and getting a few fitful winks of sleep here and there.

Ugly was when Luke's stomach started to growl, which meant the sun had to be coming up. Should be smelling grits and bacon, should be shoving Bo past the kitchen and out to the livestock. Chores before breakfast, and who was doing them back at the farm? Were they getting done at all?

Ugly was the shortness of his breath when the door got pounded on somewhere soon after that, Jesse growling that it was late enough that the building should be open to the public. (There was relief in there, somewhere, that his uncle was alive and well enough to whip him later, once the oldster realized that not only was Luke guilty as charged, but he'd brought Bo along with him on this illegal little escapade.) Ugly was knowing that the simmering Jesse was doing out there would have time to build to a full out boil. Enos wasn't about to let their uncle in, because Rosco had told him to stay put and watch the Duke boys every minute.

Ugly was Rosco arriving, the rattle of the key in the door, the ijjes and gyus in between telling Jesse just to hold his horses. Ugly was the tension in Bo's body, the way he was pretending to be too grown up to be scared, but his eyes were big and round anyway. Same as they ever had been when he'd been caught sneaking a cookie before dinner, and it must have taken every ounce of his willpower not to grab Luke's hand like he used to when they were kids. Nothing more than a deep swallow to reveal his fear.

Ugly was the way Jesse marched in, the way he was demanding the release of his boys. The way he looked at them with eyes full of questions, but didn't ask any, not then. Just wanted to know what it would take to get them free.

Ugly was the way Daisy followed him in, full of righteous indignation at how her kin were being held prisoner. Ugly was her realizing that while her cousins were on one side of the bars, her beau was on the other, guarding them.

Ugly was Enos apologizing before she could even ask what was going on, then volunteering that he'd been the one who had caught them burglarizing the records office downstairs. (Ugly was the way Jesse's eyebrows dipped at that word. Burglary. It was an ugly enough word, Luke could admit.)

Ugly wasn't pretty, it was awful enough, but it was manageable. Like a storm that might blow down a few limbs, but then it would move on. Hostile was more like a wildfire, set on burning everything in its path until there wasn't a house or a tree or even a flower left to remind you of what had been there before.

And hostile was just getting started. It was somewhere in the way Daisy's voice rose, the way her fists curled up. Hostile was her sharp words aiming themselves right at Enos' soft heart, things like: traitor, trusted you, can't believe you would do this, you know my cousins as well as I do and you know they're not criminals.

(Guilt was what made him want to defend Enos, intelligence was what made him keep his mouth shut.)

Ugly was Jesse peeling off bills from a roll and handing them to Rosco – some amount of bail must have been named – while Enos' head dipped at Daisy's volatility. Ugly was the way Daisy's face was red, the way the hostility was maybe the only thing that was keeping her from crying.

Ugly was Rosco coming over to the cell with keys in hand, opening the door to let them out. Ugly was the way that not a one of them could take their eyes off of what was happening between Daisy and Enos, how none of them even tried to get involved or make it stop.

Ugly was Luke's stomach twisting – Daisy shouldn't even have been dating a lawman, it was true, but Luke always figured it would be moonshining that would cause the rift between them – at the recognition that it was his fool plan that had turned his female cousin into a fiery, screeching harpy.

Ugly was the way Jesse put an arm around her and how she almost shrugged him off. Turned like she was going to unleash her hostility on him next, but one good look reminded her of who he was and why he was there. Reminded her that even in times as ugly as this, Dukes weren't supposed to be openly antagonistic.

Ugly was the way her head dipped. She didn't cry, not then. Just let Jesse usher her toward the swinging doors and the outside, where his pickup presumably waited.

Ugly was the way Luke and Bo followed, tails tucked like naughty dogs.


	19. A Fool in Love

**Nineteen: A Fool in Love**

 _July 31, 1974_

It was Luke's plan that saved their hides. Or, more accurately, it was the need for a plan and Luke's willingness to concoct one that saved their hides, or at least delayed the flaying of their hides.

Or maybe it was Daisy's pink eyes, the way her hair wasn't quite long enough to hide the red splotches on her face.

Or maybe it was that the old man was finally ready to give up and admit that Alice and Molly had to be tied up in this mess, somehow. Or that, at the very least, the family needed time alone and they weren't likely to get much of it. Not if they went home and got straight to the whipping. With Molly and Alice as witnesses, and Bo figured he'd never live that down.

Instead of leading the whole sad parade of Dukes directly to his pickup, parked on the square near the entrance to the courthouse (or sending the boys to retrieve their own from where it still sat in the alleyway), Jesse herded them all onto the green, over to the bench on the east side. Where Rosco would have to go out of his way to see them (but he'd looked tired and not likely to come wandering anytime soon), facing the Davenports' garage (and there was Cooter, waving at them while the other guys his father had hired actually did some measure of work) and otherwise no one would think a thing of the family of four sitting and enjoying the morning sunshine. Having a discussion that was best not overheard.

Especially not when Jesse started in with, "I don't know what you boys was up to last night, but I reckon you was in entirely the wrong place," mostly staring at Luke, because Luke was the oldest and he was always the one who was in the most trouble for whatever the three of them did. "You wasn't home when your family needed you, and whatever Rosco and them have got on you don't hardly compare to that." Staring at Bo, now, eyes staying there and not straying. That was the difference between being seventeen and being three days away from eighteen, maybe. Bo was going to have to start taking a few of his own lumps. "I ain't got time now to tell you just how disappointed I am." But he'd make time later, that was the part that went unsaid. "I reckon for now we'd best figure out what we're going to do next." About the break-in or the barn fire or any of the other problems they'd had all summer.

Daisy took a seat on the bench, and Bo settled next to her, close. Slipped an arm around her skinny shoulders and let her rest her head in the crook of his shoulder.

"Reckon you'll have to tell us about last night then," Luke suggested, leaning back against a tree. As if it was anything like comfortable to do that, as if he wasn't still wearing yesterday's dirty clothes that reeked with old sweat and jailhouse mildew. As if they weren't both starved and sleep deprived. As if he wasn't getting glared at from the corner of Jesse's eye about how if his two boys had just been home last night like they were supposed to be, they'd know the story already. Or it would be an entirely different story.

Luke withstood the silent scolding and Jesse commenced to telling the tale. How the oldster been up and on his way to use the bathroom when the fools came in. Through the kitchen window, which was silly, when no one in Hazzard ever locked their doors. But he heard them hitting the floor with heavy feet and for a few seconds he thought it was his boys. Then the house got real quiet and he knew it couldn't be Bo and Luke, since they'd never been quiet a second in their lives. So instead of going down the hall to the bathroom, Jesse'd tiptoed around the corner to the living room and saw shadows. Three of them, and he knew then that the house had been breached by strangers. His gun was hung up in the kitchen, so he'd hollered.

Daisy picked up the story for a bit from there, her voice small at first, but she warmed to the telling. She'd been awakened by Jesse yelling to his boys for help (and even Luke blanched a little at that), and it had taken what seemed like years to get herself to her own door, then out into the rest of the house. By the time she saw Jesse in the kitchen, he'd gotten hold of his gun, and the intruders were already gone. Running across the grassy paddock and off toward the tree line. She only saw two for sure, but Jesse had seen three, so she figured she just missed one. And they were men. At least she thought so.

Back to Jesse, talking about how the phone rang and while Daisy talked to Luke, their uncle poked around the kitchen, figuring out what the robbers had been up to. The one chair, separate from the others and tipped over, spoke of someone getting surprised while using it as a step-stool. Climbing up to look at the small shelf over the pantry door.

"But all they took," Jesse said, "was Lavinia's old recipe box." Which was small, made of flimsy cardboard and decorated with yellow contact paper and the word 'Recipes' on it in childish script. Holding nothing but a bunch of index cards with faded scrawl on them, and Bo remembered the year he and Luke made the box and gave it to her for Christmas. She'd sworn it was the best gift ever, even if it was really a hideous disaster. Must have been 1961, Bo calculated.

Daisy resumed telling the story, with the part of how she'd talked to Luke on the telephone – sorry she'd hung up on him and all – then called the switchboard to find Rosco. Next, there was Alice's fainting spell, the failed effort to lift her to the couch, the way Alice came to, then fainted again later (this time conveniently on the couch) and it was right about at that part of the tale that it happened.

Luke's eyes got distant, like he was looking at nothing and everything all at once. Slight curl at the corner of his lip and Bo was almost sure his eyes twinkled. That look, the one Luke got when he had an idea and that idea was just starting to formulate itself into a plan. That look that came right before he began doling out orders. That look that meant this little reprieve from a whipping was hardly going to be worth it, when there Luke was, planning to get them in trouble all over again.

* * *

Her eye kept drifting over to the Hazzard Garage. Not that Daisy was in the least interested in what was going on over there, it was just a place where things were happening, people moving around in the relative cool of the morning – it was something to watch while her family spent time in Hazzard Square, discussing their predicament.

Luke was on her left, saying it was time they stopped waiting for the other shoe to fall, that they should just go ahead and drop it themselves. The Dukes should make themselves a real easy target for whoever it was that was harassing them and… she was trying to pay attention, trying to care.

Looking over at Cooter was easier. He was rolling a tire toward the bay while one of the other guys – she'd never been properly introduced – filled the gas tank of one of those little Ford Pintos. A third guy was over to the side, looking under the hood of Mr. Murphy's colicky station wagon. Those two temporary helpers, now that she'd had some time to study them, might just be Velma's cousins. The ones that, on July Fourth, had been down the slope romping around in the races and other games. A dark-haired pair, one of which was little Irma's father. Back on that fine day when when Daisy had been wandering around the pairs of lovers on picnic blankets, looking for Enos…

Enos, exactly who she didn't want to be thinking about.

"And then Bo and me will head over toward Possum Hollow…" Luke was saying, and she figured she hadn't missed much of anything important. Sure, Luke had been a sergeant in the Marines and he was used to plotting strategy. But he relied as much on people playing by ear as he did on them actually following any of his instructions. She let herself drift away again.

To Enos, to what she felt, to what she had a right to feel. Bo and Luke weren't exactly protesting their innocence this time. If they weren't blaming Enos or pointing fingers at unfair accusations, could she?

 _Now Daisy, I'm a lawman now. I aim to look after you and protect you._

That's what he'd said, last week up at the lookout. Then only yesterday (could it have been less than 24 hours ago? It was so hard to imagine) there had been this: _I mean to protect you and I ain't going to let nothing hurt you, you understand me?_

Just what had all that looking after, all that protecting led him to do? Had he been following her or the boys? Had he been keeping an eye on Bo and Luke until they did something for which he could jail them? And what the hell (Uncle Jesse would scold her for that word if he knew she was thinking it) had her cousins been doing in the Tax Assessor's office in the first place? Enos wouldn't lie – they had to have been there, so what had they been thinking?

For one brief and almost blissful moment, she was mad at Bo and Luke instead of Enos.

"We need to keep Alice and Molly out of it. Daisy, that's where you come in."

"Why did you break into the Tax Assessor's office?" she snapped. Saw Luke's eyebrows go up in that wary way he had whenever she raised her voice to him. Like she was wild, maybe rabid, the same as that raccoon that had gotten into their barn years ago. Like she might bite him or starch his shorts, and Luke was more afraid of the latter than the former.

"Now, Daisy, this ain't the time to talk about that," Bo dismissed. "Luke's trying to—" But he wasn't exactly denying that they'd done it, either.

"What good did you think would come out of breaking into the courthouse?" Where Enos was bound to find them. Heck, if they were going to start a new career as robbers, why couldn't they have broken into the General Store? They might just have gotten away with that.

"Daisy," Bo all but whined, just like he used to when they were kids and she had a valid point that he didn't much want to hear.

"Because J.D. Hogg was in there, that's why," Luke answered. "A few weeks ago, after our barn burned. Now, can we get back to—"

No, of course they couldn't get back to his fine plan. Now Jesse, who had shown a feat of restraint in not lighting into the boys first thing after he got them out of jail, had gotten real interested in what was being said.

"What about J.D.?" Didn't sound like he was well disposed to this line of discussion, either.

Luke huffed out a sigh. Gave a dirty sort of look over toward the horizon, where it was safe. Because Jesse sure wouldn't tolerate being looked at in quite that way.

"Back after the fire. When we was in town ordering the lumber for the new barn, Cooter said he saw J.D. Hogg going to see Alma, in the library." Right, the now-and-again worker who kept track of the archives there. "Then Cooter watched him leave there and go over to the Tax Assessor's office in the courthouse. So Cooter followed up with Alma, and she told him that J.D. had been asking for information about the parcels on Bald Hill."

"Bald Hill?" Jesse frowned, and Daisy didn't much blame him for that. For the way his eyebrows twitched toward center, his nose wrinkled up and his hands curled up tight before loosening again. "What would he need with information about Bald Hill?"

"That's what I wondered," Luke answered, warming toward the direction the conversation had taken after all. "Which is why I went looking through his office in the Boar's Nest—"

"You what?" Jesse hollered, abrupt as a clap of thunder. Luke huffed again, and Bo suddenly got interested in the way his own right hand was resting in his lap. "You'd best tell me that you had the man's permission to be nosing around his things."

"No, sir, I didn't." Luke's snapped back with full conviction that he was utterly justified. "He's after Lavinia's land."

"You don't know that," Jesse countered, but it was quiet, thoughtful. Not as sure as it ought to be.

"He's up to something," Luke insisted. "And I'd bet you every penny in my bank account," which wasn't much at all, but it was all very hypothetical anyway. What with how he shared that bank account with Bo, and Bo wasn't part of this wager. "That our barn, our 'shine runs, our corn crop – all of it comes back to him. He's been beating us black and blue, Jesse!" Luke's arm came out, finger jabbing in the general direction of the farm. "And the only thing we got on him is that he don't know we're onto him." Jesse stared at him, hard. Bo found some nonexistent dirt under his thumbnail to dig at with the nail on his pinky. Daisy figured that the dirt-digging was easier to watch than the standoff between Luke and Jesse, so she joined Bo in the fascination.

"You figure – and I ain't saying I approve or nothing you've done up to now – but you figure whatever he's after has to do with Lavinia?"

"Bald Hill got left to her, didn't it?"

"It was her recipe box that got took last night," Jesse's voice was full of deep and not necessarily pleasant thoughts, his face lined heavily with exhaustion over this whole thing.

The tension in Bo's body, so close to hers, released a little. Must have figured that Luke wasn't going to get them all whipped, at least not just yet.

"Yeah, and I figure Alice's little fainting act last night wasn't no coincidence, neither. I ain't sure where Alice and Molly tie in but—"

"Told you it was them," Bo crowed. But quietly. No need to poke the bear too much.

Luke offered up a small acknowledgement of a nod. _Sure, right, you knew all along. Now can we get back to business?_ "Which is why we need Daisy to keep Molly and Alice busy. Can you do that, Daisy?"

Of course she could. She nodded and Luke picked up where she'd interrupted him, leaving her to keep right on tripping over thoughts of Enos. Whether he'd been following the boys and even if he hadn't, why he'd arrested them. If he'd just asked them to explain themselves, this could have turned out entirely differently. They all – Enos, the Dukes, maybe even Rosco – could have worked together to catch J.D. Hogg the next time he came illegally calling on the Dukes in the middle of the night.

But now it was a mess. While Enos had been busy arresting the boys, J.D. had sent minions (because none of the shadows she saw last night had been particularly short or round or quite waddled) to break into their house and—

Had Hogg known that Bo and Luke would go snooping? Had his trips to the library and records office been ruses meant to lead Bo and Luke into trouble? Had he told Rosco what was going on? Had Rosco told Enos where to find them? Was Enos part of the plotting, had all the time he'd spent with her this summer just been some sort of surveillance?

 _A penny for you thoughts…_

Couldn't be, he wouldn't spy for J.D. Hogg and he hadn't been working for Rosco all that long. (And the only reason he was a Hazzard deputy at all was because she had insisted that he go in and demand a job. Oh, what a mess she'd made.)

"Only we won't go there, see, we'll…" Luke was still talking, hands gesturing. Somewhere in there, she felt the boards of the bench shift underneath her and looked up to see that Jesse had taken a seat on the other side of Bo. Probably still thinking of all the ways he needed to punish Luke later, but for now he was willing enough to sit while he listened.

Letting her vision blur and drift again – so tired. She hadn't gotten a lot of sleep last night, her eyes just about itched with the urge to cry, but she couldn't. Not here, in front of the town (and Bo and Luke, who had never much approved of her relationship with Enos to begin with), not now, when she was supposed to be paying attention to the plan.

She settled somewhere between, watching Cooter again. Wasn't quite close enough to hear his words, just the timbre of his voice as he walked up to one of the guys that might be Velma's cousin, and said something. Elbow to the ribs to punctuate whatever it was and then there was guffawing.

Reminded her of better days spent in better places. Before the fire, before the corn patch got vandalized and the house burgled, when her biggest worries were her too-short hair and trying to look mature enough to get a job or at least impress Enos.

More laughter from over by Cooter, their mechanic friend's hand coming up to slap his co-worker on the back. The poor guy stumbled a couple of awkward steps, then wobbled back to whatever he'd been working on, as Cooter moved off to do some project of his own.

What she wouldn't give to go back to July Fourth. To time travel and tell her previous self just to stay with Velma, not to go off with Enos. To enjoy her new friend, because whatever Velma had been, she wasn't deceitful, she wasn't sneaky, and she didn't have the power to hurt Daisy's family the way Enos did.

* * *

 _August 2, 1974_

First order of business: get another police cruiser. Not yet, because the county was still broke. But first thing, as soon as there was any money at all, the sheriff's department needed one more car.

Or one less deputy, but Rosco already knew how that went. Wore him out and left him all the lonelier for Bessie Mae.

"Sheriff." Yep, new car for him, and Enos could have this old one. "You reckon I done the right thing?" As soon as there was money, which could only come about if one thing happened. It wasn't anything Rosco wanted, at least not mostly, but he figured it had to happen all the same. "About arresting the Duke boys and all." Jefferson Davis Hogg had to win the County Commissioner seat in the upcoming election. And the man had to be favorably disposed toward the sheriff's department when it happened, too.

"We're sitting here surveilling them, ain't we?" Up on Settler's Ridge, late afternoon sun making them halfway blind, but they were watching the Duke's property. Funny how nothing much happened on a farm most of the time.

"Yes, sir." Enos answered. Stared out over the same farm that wasn't doing much of anything. "But I don't see how that means that I done the right thing when it comes to the Duke boys."

"It means they're guilty, Enos. You don't surveil people that are innocent."

"But," Enos went on. Didn't flinch when Rosco stopped staring out at the nothing of the Duke farm to glower at him. "Ain't they supposed to be innocent until proven guilty?"

The boy was a fool. Tired, had to be, just look at how those circles under his eyes were almost as black as his hat. The boy needed more sleep. A good, solid knock on the head ought to do it.

"Enos, they're guilty. We caught them sneaking suspiciously around the courthouse, didn't we?" Though when he'd told the tale to J.D. Hogg in his Boar's Nest office that fateful morning, he'd left Enos out of it entirely. Hogg hadn't been so much impressed as annoyed. _Next time, you got to make sure they're doing something you can hold them on for more than one night,_ the man had said, in between slobbery bites of what might have been pork belly. "You don't break and enter and suspiciously sneak around a courthouse unless you're guilty."

"I reckon," Enos agreed. Took to studying his fingers instead of watching the Duke farm. And what the heck had Rosco brought him out here for anyway, if not to teach him the fine art of surveillance? Which was, by its nature, a quiet activity. Maybe he should dig out the binoculars, give Enos something better to stare at than his own hands. "They didn't really break in, though. I mean, they just opened a window that wasn't locked in the first place."

Rosco huffed – maybe he shouldn't have left Enos alone with those jailed Dukes all night after all. He was starting to rationalize like them. Besides, the boy shouldn't be dwelling so hard on that unlocked window in Rosco's own office. "Enos, you done the right thing. Now just hush."

And – miracle of the week – the boy did. For about half a minute, they both looked out over the nothing that was still happening down on the Dukes' property. Not even a goat stirring.

"It's just—"

"Enos," he snapped, and the dunce quit talking. "Here, take these," he said, reaching behind the passenger seat – hunting around and almost pulling his arm out of the socket in the process (which really went to prove that he needed two cars for the department, so he could keep his important tools on the passenger seat instead of behind it) – for the binoculars. "And go on down the road a piece. See if you can see anything." Other than the dead grass of late summer, and the same old farmhouse that never moved.

Rosco tried to hand off the binoculars, Enos grabbed for them and missed. Then he got hold of them but the strap was still wrapped around Rosco's fingers. Enos tugged and the strap got tighter, which only made Rosco's fingers start to turn blue.

"Enos!" he blurted. "Would you just – just…" Somewhere along the fifth try, Enos finally managed to get the binoculars free. "Now go."

"Yes, sir." The boy opened the passenger door, but didn't get out. Not yet. "It's just, I knowed those boys my whole life, Sheriff. And they ain't never done nothing for no reason." Rosco's head was spinning from that sentence alone. "I figure, there was to be something that made them do it, and I wonder what it was."

"They did because they're criminals Enos. Now git."

Enos got.

The poor boy was just a fool. A fool in love which made him a double fool, and then more foolishness on top of that. Tying himself in knots over that girl, the Duke boys' cousin, and maybe Rosco knew what that felt like. Maybe he missed his Messy Bay more than he liked to think about. But that didn't make Enos any less foolish for being as worked up as he was. Walking down the dirt lane to get a good angle on the Duke farm, but his head was down and his shoulders slumped. The whippersnapper was going to have choose between being a law enforcement officer and being in love, and soon, or he'd get his heart broken the same as Rosco had.

That thought didn't even get a chance to complete itself before Enos was running back toward the cruiser. Rosco knew why, could see it, too. Started to pull forward even before Enos reached the passenger side door. Had to stop and wait for the deputy, then almost pulled away again before he got seated.

"Enos, would you hurry up?" he hollered, trying to tell his right foot to just wait just another few seconds, but it really wanted to go, and now.

Because quite suddenly, in a cloud of dust rising up toward the ridge, the Duke boys were in the family moonshine runner and on the move.


	20. Five Cards Short of a Full Deck

**Twenty: Five Cards Short of a Full Deck**

 _August 2, 1974_

It was almost, but not quite, ridiculous. Like one of those plays they used to stage back in school.

The curtain opened, right after an early supper, on a scene that featured Daisy loudly declaring her interest in playing cards tonight. Maybe poker, five card draw, and wouldn't everyone join in? Jesse opting out on the loose excuse of work-to-do, screen door slapping shut behind him. Bo making a stink about how he and Luke had better things to do, too, but letting himself be pulled in. Luke helping out, going off to their bedroom to dig for that deck of cards they were going to need. Shouting over his shoulder toward the living room to ask if Bo was planning to deal from the top or the bottom of the deck, and oh, how the boy's eyebrows came down and his face twisted in annoyance at that. Luke impugning his honor, but even if the two of them would be long gone before the second act was due to begin, Luke figured Bo wouldn't want to be beaten by Daisy or Molly (and especially not Alice).

That whole spectacle was distracting and noisy, so no one noticed scene two, which was Jesse riding off on the back of his mule. It helped, probably, that he stuck to the tree-line when he did it.

Scene three had Luke in the dim light of evening, rubbing his sore butt from sitting on the living room floor in front of the low coffee table. They were somewhere in the middle of the ninth or eleventh hand, and he had a full house, jacks over sevens, with every intention of taking the pot (of toothpicks, because none of them had much of anything else to throw in) when the call came. Jesse, using a hand-held walkie-talkie over the emergency frequency to reach them on the CB, and they were all counting on Molly and Alice not realizing that in order fro them to receive his call, he had to be close.

Luke wasn't in any mood to get up and answer the CB, not now when he was about to win, so Bo did the honors. Had an incredibly stilted (and incredibly loud, but that part was pretty normal, anyway) conversation with Jesse in which the oldster declared that his boys were needed right away to help him at "the place." Luke figured the hand was doomed anyway, so he hopped up from the game to join Bo in the kitchen. Taking the microphone out of Bo's hand to offer a perfectly-normal sounding, "Ten-four," followed by a "Let's go, Bo!"

At the start of scene four, he was already out in Tilly, getting backed out of the back barn, when he realized he was still holding his jacks and sevens. Oh, well, Daisy would have to continue the charade of playing poker without those cards. Maybe scene five wouldn't last long enough for Molly or Alice to realize that any were missing anyway. Luke stuffed the rogue cards into the glove compartment.

Bo let the wheels slip in the loose dirt of the farmyard, kicking up twice as much dust as necessary, revving the engine until Santa Claus up at the North Pole should have been able to hear it, then taking off. Leaving behind such a cloud that there was no way to tell who might have been following them. (But they didn't have to know yet. Later on it would become important, and they could figure it out then.)

They took an oblong path, crossing over Route 81 into town, sliding by the Boar's Nest, wandering past Black Hollow and up to Timbertop Ridge, leaving an easy trail to follow in the pinkish-orange twilight. Bo tapped the brakes every now and then, just in case the spray of dust wasn't enough.

Finally, they ended up where they just as easily might have begun, driving the lane that ran along the north edge of their own land, as far from the house as they could be and still be on Duke property. Unimproved out here, mostly woods with the old shack that had been someone's honeymoon escape a few generations back and was now mostly ruins. A trail leading up the hill where a young pair of Duke cousins used to play ridiculous games of cowboys and Indians, and they left _Tilly_ behind the scrawniest bush they could find. Enough cover to pretend they were hiding her, anyway. Then they walked slowly up the path, Bo's blond hair and yellow shirt gleaming all the way.

Still no sign of an ancient, pink-hued pickup truck and no signal from Daisy, so Act Two hadn't begun. But Luke still half figured that Molly and Alice weren't their biggest threat, anyway. They'd probably be along eventually, but he reckoned that a Cadillac would make its entrance first. Meanwhile, they might as well enjoy this peaceful little intermission.

They had been able to see the smoke billowing up out of the half-crumbled, stone fireplace from the lane; by the time they got up to where Jesse was stoking it in the foundation of what had once been a cabin, they were just about choking.

"What did you put in there?" Bo coughed out when they got close enough. It was almost rancid, closer to a taste than a smell, and far too reminiscent of what it had been like to clean up what was left of their main barn. The old man was smart enough to be standing upwind of his fine disaster of a fire.

"Some of them moldy old burlap sacks from the root cellar. The ones that you boys was supposed to get rid of months ago," Jesse answered, wrinkles around the corners of his eyes going to prove that the scolding wasn't entirely serious. (Maybe the intermission hadn't begun after all, and Jesse was playing out one extra scene for his own entertainment.) "Plus a bunch of leaves and rotted-out wood."

"Smells like it," Bo complained back at him.

"Well then get over here. Even a mule's got enough sense to stand upwind of a fire." And sure enough, there was Maudine, tethered to a tree not far from Jesse, offering up the same smug, chiding look as their uncle.

The darkness settled around them, their fire sending out a glowing beacon like Paul Revere's lanterns – one if by land, two if by sea. The truth was, whatever invasion they were expecting tonight would come by land and there was pretty much only one good way to get up here: follow the same trail that Bo and Luke had. The three of them watched and waited and knew the second act wouldn't start just yet, it would wait until the crickets had settled into their rhythm for the night, when the nearly-full moon was resting, fat and yellow, on the western horizon.

Nothing would happen until after Luke and Bo had taken their loud leave, so they did. Saying goodnight and happy cooking and we're just a CB call away when you need us again. Jesse admonishing them to behave themselves tonight better than they had on Tuesday (which felt a mite more real than acted) and waving them on their way.

Back down to _Tilly_ , with Luke behind the wheel this time. Driving more gently than Bo ever did, trying to look like he was being careful when he was actually being visible, staying under the speed limit so no cop had any excuse to mess with him. Heading towards town, smooth hum of the engine that wasn't being taxed by Bo's heavy foot.

When they hit Jennings Crossing, instead of going into town, Luke turned off the headlights and pulled a one-eighty. Stayed away from the brake pedal, using the gears to slow him instead, and right back the way they came. Not all the way back, though; using the emergency brake to stop about a half mile from where they'd last parked, and stashing the car in the bushes good and proper, this time. "Let's go, Bo," and they were crawling out _Tilly_ 's windows so they wouldn't have to slam the doors after themselves. Luke leaning back in to grab the walkie-talkie they'd stashed in there earlier, then hitting the ground with the sort of stealth he and Bo mastered before they'd even learned fractions.

Tucked the walkie-talkie into his shirt, then he started bushwhacking through the tangles and briars, up the hill the hard way, the way no one in their right mind would go. Reaching back to offer Bo a hand up when his slippery-soled boots couldn't handle the terrain on their own, grunting at the extra weight and otherwise making their way in silence. Not quite back to Jesse, just to where they needed to be. To where no one would see them, but they could see everything. To wait for the next scene to unfold.

* * *

Poker wasn't her game. Especially not when she hadn't planned to play this long and, moreover, she was secretly playing five cards short of a full deck.

Daisy got up from the game on the pretense of getting everyone some lemonade, double checked that the CB receiver in the kitchen was turned on (but of course it was, it had squawked just fine earlier) and that the volume was high enough. Poured the lemonade, awkwardly carried the three glasses of it back into the living room. Played another couple of hands, then went back into the kitchen to get everyone a refill and check the CB again.

The dang thing was working, it had to be. Which didn't explain why she hadn't heard the slightest peep out of any of them.

Not Cooter, who was stationed outside J.D. Hogg's house in town. Watching for the man to leave, and if he did, Cooter would spout some nonsense over the airwaves about the turkey having flown before Thanksgiving. Once he did that, Daisy was supposed to head out, then stash her car in the shrubs along Old Mill Road and wait to see what Molly and Alice did. Except the turkey apparently didn't know it was supposed to have wings.

There'd also been nothing from the boys. They weren't, either one of them, known to be skilled communicators. Still, it was Luke's plan and he ought to have enough manners to let her know how it was going in whatever code language he wanted to use.

Not a peep out of Jesse, either. That part was good, she supposed. It meant he wasn't in any danger.

Molly and Alice, oddly, seemed plenty content to sip at sweet drinks and play cards all night. That incomplete deck was a greater challenge to disguise with each successive hand, and lemonade wasn't moonshine. No one was getting drunk and someone was going to start wondering about those sevens and jacks pretty soon.

Meanwhile, darkness had dropped down over the farmhouse like a shroud, and soon it wouldn't matter whether the CB squawked or didn't. She'd have to put an end to this charade of a game.

And still, the CB receiver didn't squeal, buzz or otherwise give her any answers.

Too dark, too late, too little information, and she had to go. What had she been thinking, leaving her kin out there this long? The barn had been burned, their corn crop vandalized, their deliveries hounded; what was next? Could be anything, and she'd just been sitting here, playing cards with Molly and Alice, who might just be in on the plot against the Dukes. She couldn't use the CB – not in front of them – so she had to go. Had to get out of the house.

"I need to go."

"Go?" Molly asked her. "Where child?"

Right, where. Where was she going, now that she was on her feet? Straightening the sundress she was wearing, scanning the room for her purse.

"Out." That was brilliant. "For a ride. To get some fresh air."

"We can open the windows," Alice offered, helpfully. "The ones that aren't already open, anyway." Because it was August and almost all of them were flung wide already.

"No," Daisy replied, too quickly. "Thank you. I just really love the way the air blows in the windows when I'm driving." Now she sounded like a lunatic.

"Well, that sounds nice, doesn't it, Alice? I believe we'll come along with you for that ride."

"Oh." Daisy tried to think. But it was hard when Alice was nodding her head vigorously at the idea and climbing up to her feet, stumbling like maybe she was half drunk on lemonade after all. "Well, I—"

"Now, a pretty, young thing like you," Molly started and Daisy had the oddest feeling that, like Hansel and Gretel, she was about to be invited to climb into the oven. "Shouldn't be riding around alone at this hour."

Alice nodded enthusiastically about that, too. Right hand getting licked, then smoothing down that cowlick in her hair like she was excited to come along on a pointless ride, and wanted to look her best for it.

"No, really, I'll be fine," Daisy swore. "I can look out for myself." Molly shook her head, and it was starting to feel an awful lot like she and Alice did not want to let Daisy out of their sight.

Which left Daisy to wonder whether they were working on some weird plan of their own (other than cooking her for next Sunday's dinner) or whether sleeping in her room wasn't enough and they wanted to spend every waking moment with her, too. "And then there's Enos." Of course, Enos, now that was a smart choice. Then again, saying his name left a lump in her throat. "You know, the deputy?"

"Her beau," Alice clarified for them all, giggling giddily.

"Right. He'll look out for me."

"Oh, you're going to see Enos?" Molly asked her. Didn't wait for an answer, which meant Daisy didn't have to lie. "Why didn't you say so? The last thing a girl wants on a date with her is two other women. Especially when one of them is as young and pretty as Alice." Right, that was exactly why Daisy didn't want them along. Because she was afraid Alice would steal Enos out from under her. Even if she didn't precisely want to stake any kind of claim on Enos right now. "All right, go on. I can see you're eager to get to him. So git!"

Daisy got.

* * *

There was nothing at all: darkness, quiet, waiting. Trap set, baited, tensed to snap.

Then there was everything all at once: Luke's yelp of surprise from the other side of the path they had been flanking, a flash of light, leaves crunching. A hard smack of skin on skin, a grunt.

"Luke!" Bo's own voice, hollering before he could even think, the loose ground slipping under his boot soles as he tried to run. "Luke," again, sound of another hard smack, a thud. The whap of a low tree branch across Bo's face as he moved, his hands going out in front of him to protect what he could, but not slowing.

"Luke? Bo?" That was Jesse, calling from up the hill by his awful fire. Was he in trouble too? A growl (that was probably Luke – he did that sometimes when a fight dragged him down to his most feral level), another grunt. "Boys?"

Tripping over a root or a rock, jolting shock of going down on his knees and then hands, smell of dirt and green things, scrambling to find his feet. Fingers caught in the net that he and Luke had laid under the leaves to catch anyone that tried to come up here. But whoever it was that was hitting Luke had managed come around another way after all. From behind or the side.

Feet finally under him, running toward where he'd last known Luke to be, toward where the scuffle was happening.

"Uh." That was Luke, maybe. Could have been someone else, but it had sounded like Luke, sounded like someone getting hit hard enough that all they could do was let out a groan.

"Luke!" How could it be that he just kept running and somehow didn't ever get any closer to the fight? What had they done to Luke?

"Get him!" A stranger's voice, female. Shaky like Molly's, but different pitch, lower. "You fools!"

Didn't make sense, some woman after Luke; didn't matter. His hand hit something solid, moving. He grabbed hold of what he could, a shirt, maybe, and pulled it toward him. Heard the rip, heard the grunt of surprise. Pulled back his fist and swung at what he couldn't see. Could only feel, felt like he just grazed against cloth and skin, not a solid hit. Pulled back his arm to try again, and it caught on something.

Or got caught; that was a hand on his bicep, near his elbow, holding him back. Pulling on him, twisting his arm and spinning him, pinning him against the nearest hard surface. Rough tree bark against his chest, smell of sap.

"Ow," he yelled, but he was more angry than hurt.

"Bo?" Close to his back, confused.

"Luke?" He said back, felt himself get released. Stupid, nervous laugh, could have been his or his cousin's – they had been fighting each other. "Where—" are the bad guys, and who are they, anyway? But he never got past that first word before he felt himself being propelled forward again. Taste of blood and dirt in his mouth, leaves crunching near his head and stars behind his eyes. Must be on the ground, and based on the stripe of pain down his chest and left arm, he probably hit the tree on his way down. He meant to call for his cousin again, but it came out as more of a moan.

Scuffling, leaves, feet close to his head. Had to get up, arms under to shove himself to all fours, and his head spun with just that little. Tried to shake it off, only made him dizzier, and someone stepped on his hand.

"Ow!" he hollered again, but it wasn't Luke hurting him this time. Couldn't have been or he would have stepped away, wouldn't have shifted his weight to press a boot heel down all the harder on Bo's hand, wouldn't have twisted and turned it a couple of times.

There wasn't much he could do except use his free hand to swat at the leg that the boot was attached to. To ball up a fist and punch.

"Boys?" Jesse again, closer. Luke had a flashlight; where was it now? A lantern, a match, even – he needed something that would tell him where his kin were, who were friends and who were enemies. Anything that would give him his bearings.

He shook out his hand once the weight was gone from it, didn't help the pain. Used his good hand to push himself to standing. Trying to figure out where anything at all was in the heavily shadowed moonlight, with his head ringing like a church bell on Sunday morning. Couldn't even see the fire their uncle had lit in the old fireplace – must be down in a low patch of land, one of those places that held water for a while after a good, soaking rain.

"Uhn," made him stop worrying about himself and where he was. Someone just took a punch. Might have been Luke on either end.

"Hey!" That wasn't Luke. Wasn't anyone he knew by voice, either. He moved in that direction, good hand out in front of him to search for anything at all, bad hand kept protectively close. Stumbling over a root or a rock (at least he hoped whatever it was wasn't a fallen family member), catching his balance, moving forward.

"Boys!" Jesse again. Bo ought to answer him, really should, but if the darkness was his foe, it was also his friend. He probably shouldn't broadcast his position like a CB transmission. "Dagnabbit!"

That was only frustration, Bo told himself. Jesse was just upset that his nephews weren't answering him. The old man was fine, he wasn't in any sort of danger—

And then it didn't matter, there was cloth under his fingers, warmth, and he cocked his bad fist and popped it forward quick. Hit something that might have been bicep or chest or belly – felt loose and flabby, elicited a grunt – then ducked. Cause and effect, if he hit, he could expect to be hit back, unless he got out of the way.

Cradling his sore hand again – next time he was going to feel around with his bad hand so he could hit with the good one. (There wasn't going to be a next time. He needed to end this thing here and now.)

Scuffle in the leaves, breeze past his cheek as he stood again – swing and miss. It took everything in him not to call out _strike one_. He took another quick jab into flesh, tried to duck again, and his chin got met by something hard. A knee, maybe, changed the pitch of the ringing in his ears, the speed with which his head spun, left him with the flavor of blood in his mouth. But it wasn't too bad, couldn't be. He was still on his feet. There was a sudden growl of frustration; Bo figured it meant another swing and miss. _Strike two_.

He stayed low, turned his good fist with intent to jab upwards at breastbone or chin, depending on his opponent's size and position. Ready to deal what he hoped would be a devastating blow and—

"Let go of me, you varmint!" That was Jesse. Jesse in trouble and whoever these guys were, they fought mean. Bo turned toward the sound, intent on leaving this fight behind to go help his uncle—

Flash of light behind his eyes, pain. Something hit him over the head, hard. But he was still upright, still going to help Jesse, and—

 _Bam!_

 _That_ flash of light wasn't just in his head, that was Jesse's shotgun.

"Jes—" he said, got only halfway there before another blinding flash, another wave of pain and he was on his knees, all fours, going down, down, down…

Into blackness.


	21. Zipped Lips and Eerie Silences

_**Author's note:** I have been informed that the last chapter ended with a nasty cliffhanger. I have further been informed that I need to update immediately. So here's an update, even though I don't think it's really going to help anything as far as resolution goes. Still, I have now done as I was told._

* * *

 **Twenty-one: Zipped Lips and Eerie Silences**

 _August 2, 1974_

His ears were ringing (or his bell had been rung), his leg was twisted and there was a mean sore spot in the middle of his back where he'd rolled over a root or stone as he wrestled against some crazed bad guy. At least he figured it was a guy – Alice was a good wrestler, but he didn't suppose she'd be quite so heavy. And though she could be sneaky, he didn't think she was wily enough to have crept up behind him on a wild slope at the far edge of the Dukes' own property.

But none of his aches and pains mattered, because Jesse had hollered, and then his shotgun had gone off. Once, but echoing off the line of hills to the west so it sounded like two shots, and Luke took advantage of his opponent's surprise. Rolled him over and got the upper hand, fist cocked back to finish him off, when the shotgun rang out again.

Which pulled Luke away from his selfish goal of doling out pain in equal measures to what he'd received, and had him scrambling in the dirt. Trying to get to his feet on uneven ground in slippery boots, getting shoved from somewhere, landing on his elbow and shoulder. Never mind retaliation, he had to get to Jesse. Rocking like a turtle on its back until he got his elbows under him, saw the shadow of the man he'd just been fighting limping off as it crossed through the furthest edge of the glow from the fire that Jesse had lit hours ago up by the fake still. It wasn't Alice's shadow and it was far too thin to belong to J.D. Hogg.

Then he was on his feet, running toward the smell of gun powder, stones turning under his boot soles, clothes catching on the undergrowth. Squinting up the slope, trying to see anything at all in the thin light and there it was. A bulk of a man on all fours, then one knee. By the time Jesse was struggling back to his feet, Luke was at his side to grab him under the arm and help him stand.

"You all right, Uncle Jesse?" he gasped, breathless. Wiped his hand across his mouth, winced at the sting of sweat and dirt in a new split across his bottom lip.

"Fine," the old man said, shaking off the help. Wiping away his own share of dirt onto the bib of his overalls, then bending low to retrieve his shotgun. "Just some wet-behind-the-ears thug figuring he could push me around. Took off pretty quick when I fired off my shotgun, though," he added, probably smiling with pride.

"They all did," Luke agreed, and as if to punctuate that thought, an engine sputtered grudgingly to life down near the road. "You got any idea who they was?" Gears got painfully ground against one another.

"Not Molly and Alice or J.D." It should have been smug, should have been full of I-told-you-sos, but it was too busy being confused or just plain old contemplative. "I ain't got the first idea." But he was chewing something over in that grizzled head of his.

"If you're okay, I reckon me and Bo had best get after them." Not that they had to hurry too much. Sounded like either the driver or the vehicle below them wasn't in tip-top shape, if the effort to get the gears right was any indication. Had to have been parked down close to the lane, a little south of where he and Bo had left _Tilly_.

"Go on, I'm fine I said." The old man was looking at his hands for scrapes or cuts, though. "Git!" when he didn't find anything worth worrying about.

"Bo," Luke hollered, trotting back down toward where they'd laid their useless trap. Seemed stupid now to think they could have caught people like so many fish in a net, but it had worked for many a moonshiner before them, including their own fathers. It almost seemed like their attackers knew a few moonshining tricks of their own. (But it hadn't been JD or Molly, so who could it have been? Someone – a few someones, maybe three or four of them? – young and strong.) "Bo, come on." His cousin had been right there with him, close enough to hit him, until the tail end of the fight had pulled them in different directions – Luke down, and with any luck, Bo had kept his feet – but he couldn't have gone far. "Let's get a move on."

No response, not even a rustle of leaves. Bo was lazy most days and slow on others, but never, not once in his life, had he ever been quiet.

"Bo?" Nothing.

Just minutes ago it had been so much of everything all at once. Now it was nothing at all.

Bo had to be there, must be hurt. Hit his head, took a hard punch, had a mouthful of dirt, maybe.

"Bo!"

Some part of him broken, maybe bit his tongue so badly he couldn't talk (but he would still be able to scream), ears ringing so loud he couldn't hear? Had to be something, but whatever it was, it couldn't be too bad. Bo was strong, he was good in a fight.

(He wasn't answering.)

"Bo!" Leaves rustling now, but that was just Uncle Jesse, trundling down the hill towards him just as fast as it was safe for him to move. Hollering: "You hear me, boy?"

But calling wasn't getting them anywhere. Bo wasn't responding, wasn't going to respond. Luke would have to find him without using his ears. Without much help from his eyes, either, since every stone, every tree root, every lump and bump of the land could be more than it looked like, or less. Could be Bo, out cold and hurt, vulnerable to heavy-stepping feet that moved too quickly.

"Bo Duke!" Jesse, promising whippings with no more than the tone of his voice. "You'd best answer me when I'm talking to you!"

Meanwhile, Luke was drawing all on his memories of night missions, slinking around jungle hillsides in heavy rain with the threat of mines all ahead, and how he'd kept everyone together, kept them safe. Should have been worse than this, should have been more frightening than tonight, but his heart was pounding a terrified rhythm all the same. This mission was different. This mission involved Bo.

Back to where he'd last seen his cousin, last touched him before they got pulled apart and into the fight, but there was nothing to see now, nothing to feel.

"Light," he called back up the hill. He'd had a flashlight – where had it gone? Lost in the struggle. "Jesse, we need light!" Which meant the oldster reversing course, heading back toward to fire and anything that would burn like a torch, and left Luke to feel around devastatingly slowly for his potentially badly hurt baby cousin.

What if both of those shots hadn't come from Jesse's gun? No, they had to have. Luke knew enough about artillery and echoes to be sure of it.

(But what if they hadn't?)

Hell on it, he couldn't be as careful as he wanted. If Bo was bleeding he had to locate him fast. Stooping low, hands surveying frantically in front of him, hoping like hell that he'd find Bo with his next step or the one after that, hollering out his cousin's name, and that was when he saw it.

Light below, bobbing like a drowning swimmer, but climbing up the hill all the same.

* * *

"Enos! Would you just," but it was unlikely that Enos would just anything-at-all. "Cyst and decease?" No, that wasn't quite right. The boy's annoying qualities were having a negative impact on Rosco's speech functions. "Decease and Cyst?" Young, fresh, eager and irritating as anything. "Would you just quit it?"

"Yes, sir." There, now, that was better. That was an inferior officer submitting to the will of his superior. "It's just, I don't reckon them Dukes went this way."

And that was the real problem at hand. Those Dukes had torn out of their own farmyard like a bobcat with a rabbit on its tail. No, wait, that was a… never mind. He couldn't even think straight with the nattering coming at him from the passenger seat.

The thing was, the Dukes had taken off and by the time that spastic deputy of his had made it back into the car and the law of Hazzard had managed to get rolling along on Settler's Ridge, the Dukes had been out of sight. And they'd never been in sight since.

"Enos, now, I'm the boss and I'm driving and we're going this way, so you just hush up. You hear me?" It had been hours. Too many hours, and maybe Enos was tired. Maybe he was confused and maybe he was scared of the dark that had closed in around them like it wanted those Dukes to get away. It didn't matter what Enos was, because Rosco was the senior officer, he was in change and most importantly, he was driving.

"Yes, sir." And that was that. "It's just—" or not.

"Enos, zip it."

"Yes—"

"Zip!" And thankfully, the boy finally saw some sense. Saw who was experienced and who was a rookie, saw right from wrong and the chain of command and—

Rosco all but stood on the cruiser's brakes, braced his arms on the steering wheel and felt the back end fishtail then swing around all the same. Gritted his teeth until his jaw ached, closed his eyes and if he didn't pray, it was only because he didn't have time. Besides, he was choking on the smell of burnt rubber.

 _Wham!_

The cruiser jolted to a neck-wrenching stop, its back fender up against a boulder that was right smack in the middle of the road. Well, it was one of three boulders and now that he thought about it, they marked the dead end of Old Indian Caves Road.

"Enos!" he hollered, not entirely sure why. Except that his silly deputy's hat had fallen down over his eyes, and his fool arms were outstretched and patting at the dashboard like if he knocked his hand against it enough times, he'd be able to see again. "Why didn't you tell me about them rocks?"

"I figured you knew about them already," Enos squeaked out.

"Of course I knew about them!" At least he mostly did. Except when he forgot about them. "That don't mean it wasn't your job to warn me that they were there."

"Yes, sir," was nasal and muted by felt. Rosco finally took pity on the rookie and shoved his hat back for him. "That's why," he said, blinking owlishly at the headlights' glow in front of them, then rubbing at his eyes. "I figured them Dukes didn't come this way. Because this road don't lead nowhere, and Bo and Luke, they know that. Being as they used to come out here when they was playing hooky from school."

"Enos, what did I tell you?"

"Zip it?"

"Zip." Rosco confirmed.

An echoing metallic screech drowned out the singing of cicadas as he pulled the car away from the stone it had come to rest against, but other than a persistent rattle (that was almost, but not quite, as annoying as Enos) the car seemed in workable order. Which meant he could continue searching for those pesky Dukes. For fifteen, twenty minutes, tops, he skulked around mountain switchbacks and dipped into the hollows without getting any lip (or any help) from the man to his right. Black patches of nowhere important, perfect place to hide a still or cloak sneaky boys up to no good—

"Ijit!" That was another one of those things he hadn't meant to blurt, but he had to admit it wasn't Enos' fault this time.

No, Enos was over there biting his lips in an effort to keep them zipped, and Rosco was left to his own devices. Which was exactly what he wanted. Mostly.

"Enos, did you see that?"

"Mm-hmm," split the difference somewhere between zipped and unzipped.

Meanwhile, the pale blue van that had just cut through Rosco's headlights careened off of the Ridge Road and on down Green Apple Lane, taking curves and bumps so fast it was a wonder it stayed upright.

Rosco's foot automatically crushed down against the accelerator, and his hand flipped the toggle for his overhead flashers, turning the trees that were sewn right up close to the road alternating shades of red and blue.

"Don't reckon them's those Dukes up there driving that van," he mumbled.

"Mm-mm," Enos answered, lips probably still curled into his mouth. Silently judging Rosco's course-changing decision to give up looking for the Dukes in favor of chasing a speeder, no doubt. Wondering why his superior officer would do something so illogical and—

"That driver's up there is a lawbreaker!" Rosco blurted. "A reckless driver, and he's probably drunk, too!"

Rosco left out the part where he like a hound dog on the trail of a fox – even if he was tracking one specific fox, seeing another go running by was just too much temptation. High speed chases, for any reason at all, were just plain fun.

"Mm-hmm," Enos agreed, head bobbing enthusiastically. Which either meant he agreed with Rosco's logic or he liked a good chase as much as the next guy. Or that he had finally learned sense and wasn't going to harass and annoy his superior officer with pointless disagreements and questions. (But that last one seemed unlikely.)

Didn't matter what Enos thought, because the car surged underneath them like a horse charging through an open gate, and there was nothing but the gust of wind thumping in through the windows, the smell of road dust mixed with exhaust, and red and blue gleaming around them like some kind of demented lighthouse beaming out a beacon over dry land.

"He thinks he can shake me," Rosco commented when the chase forked off onto Lakes Road. "He don't know who he's messing with. I'm gonna get him, I'm serious," he informed Enos, who had the good sense not to bother answering back.

He followed the van down to the rutted road that didn't even have a name, but ran along the edge of Hazzard Pond, the one that fishermen parked along in the day and where kids went in pairs to make out at night. The cruiser fishtailed on the turn.

"Mmm!" Enos said, eyes all but popping out of his head. Pointing out in front of them like he was telling Rosco to look at the road instead of his face, but that was silly. Rosco knew how to drive, he'd been driving since Enos was in diapers and—

It was right about then, imagining a baby Enos wetting himself, that Rosco felt the kind of lift and floating sensation that no car should ever have. No more bumps under the wheels, nothing anywhere but air. Then the splash came, cold water hitting his face, sneaking into his mouth, and he tried to spit it out, but by then the siren was warbling and the water was rushing in from the cracks in the door and the open windows, stinky old fish smell all around. Cold and slimy and he couldn't swim, had to think about how deep the water was here. Meanwhile the van kept on trundling down the road until it was out of sight.

At least, he consoled himself, Enos didn't scream or holler or even complain that somehow Rosco had landed the county's one and only cruiser in a pond. He just kept his lips zipped through the whole thing.

* * *

She'd made the trip here dark – no headlights – even if she wasn't running 'shine, even if Jesse wasn't really making 'shine up on the old outdoor fireplace on that briar-strewn slope at the nearly forgotten far edge of Duke land.

She'd come dark to keep the wrong people from following, she'd come dark because she wanted to be alone. She'd come dark because she was of moonshiner's blood, and she'd come dark because she could. She was one of the best drivers in the county.

She'd arrived dark, so there were no headlights to turn off. Just an engine to quiet and then she figured she'd sneak up the trail to look for her kin. Except that as soon as the hum and rattle of the pickup's engine was done echoing off the hillsides around, it was obvious that there was no reason for stealth.

 _Light_ , came tumbling down the hill in Luke's rough and ragged voice, _Jesse, we need light!_

Light – she reached for the glove compartment, shaky fingers fiddling awkwardly with the latch until the little door bounced open with a muted thud, then she fished around inside. So much stuff: papers, gloves, a map, something sticky that she dropped to the floor, something else trying to roll away from her and then there was the cool metal of a flashlight in her hand.

 _Bo!_ Luke's voice again, caught somewhere between angry and alarmed and thoroughly upset in a way that Luke didn't ever get, not since he was a kid with a hot temper and a quick-swinging fist.

Running, Daisy's legs were moving fast over the rough ground. She couldn't remember closing the door to the pickup, wasn't sure she'd bothered and decided she didn't care. Flashlight's beam bouncing in front of her in wild and uneven circles, catching momentarily on this tree and that rock, and then there was a body charging at her. Luke, she recognized his run even before he skidded into the light, his big hand warm over hers and yanking the flashlight out of it. Starting back up the hill, slowing long enough to grab her hand in his free one and drag her back up with him.

Just gasping for air, just trying not to trip or get whipped in the face by a recoiling branch – that was all she could do until some arbitrary location was reached and Luke let her go.

Hands on her knees, focusing on catching her breath to say anything at all, and the next thing she knew, Jesse was next to her. Holding some sort of hastily fashioned torch that wasn't much of anything more than something – maybe a piece of Maudine's horse blanket? – tied onto the end of a stick. Its smell was stronger than the ghostly arc of light it threw.

"You all right, girl?" her uncle asked, as she sucked in some air – wished mightily for water, even just a sip – and nodded.

"What," she tried. It came out a bare, raspy grunt. "Happened?"

Jesse patted her on the back like she was choking. It didn't do much for her breathing, but it might just have steadied her a bit. Made her think that maybe everything would be okay after all, as long as she had her uncle next to her.

"Don't rightly know," he answered. Daisy straightened up and pushed her hair back from her eyes. Luke was moving amongst the trees, flashlight swinging from side to side in a search pattern that only he would understand. "Someone ambushed the boys before the boys could ambush them, and—"

"Bo!" Luke yelled, bending low to peer under... something up ahead that Daisy didn't get a good enough look at because the flashlight moved away from it and started sweeping again.

"They was fighting with them and one of them come after me—"

What? That wasn't fair! Bo and Luke were young and strong and heck, they liked a good fight, but Uncle Jesse was old and could easily be hurt and where would the Duke clan be without him?

"—I'm fine, girl," he said, even if she could swear she hadn't uttered a single one of her thoughts out loud. (She might have squeaked, though.) "Oh, they knocked me over, but I sent a couple of shotgun blasts into the air on the way down. They ran off like a bunch of rats scattering from a kitchen light. Luke and Bo was going to go after them, but—"

Luke was a one-man search party, and Bo was… nowhere. Missing, and what had she been doing? Standing around, worrying over her lost breath and what good would breathing be if her heart stopped beating? She was sure it would break if something awful had happened to Bo.

"Come on," she said, gesturing out into the darkness. Taking a step and then frowning because the woods wasn't like a road or a farmyard. There was nothing linear about it, nothing logical, and, "Where do we start?" She'd already come up the only path, and Bo wasn't there.

For all of a second Jesse looked as unsure as she felt, then he handed off that thing that was mostly a stick and only vaguely a torch, and started marching toward Luke in that deceptively quick way he had. Arms swinging and legs churning, leaving her no choice but to follow, if only to provide what little light she could against him tripping.

"Luke!" Jesse called and if the flashlight swung briefly toward where his uncle was hollering for him, Luke showed no other indication that he'd heard. "Luke, you mind me now."

That made the flashlight go still. Even if there wasn't any light shining directly on him, Daisy could imagine Luke's shoulders slumping. Head dropping, then shaking and there it was. The flashlight making its way back toward her and Jesse. They met up in middle ground.

"Where exactly was you when you last saw him?"

Luke huffed. He never did like marching to someone else's orders.

"There," Luke said, flashlight beam jutting out angrily at one pile of leaves that looked about the same as any other pile out here, except that it was a little dug up and mixed with dirt. Free hand wiping across his face and Daisy sucked in a breath at the red smear spreading out toward his cheek.

"Luke—" _you're bleeding_ , was where her words had been going. Except that there was a sudden, bouncing beam of light below them, and her cousin was off again. Trotting at an angle down the slope, sure-footed as ever. She and Jesse stepped carefully over mossy stones at a much slower pace.

By the time they got down to where the two sets of flashlights had met up, there was some kind of a stare-off going on between Luke and Molly. Thin as a reed and short besides, Molly was no match for the burly oldest Duke cousin. But she stood her ground, hands solidly on hips and face scrunched up, eyes locking hard with Luke's. Alice was at her side, the flashlight held loosely in her hand, beam shining mostly on the ground. Big-eyed, waiting for Luke's short fuse, lit by Molly's short temper, to just go ahead and blow them all to smithereens.

"Molly?" Jesse said. "What are you doing here?"

It wasn't an accusation, at least not mostly. There was an edge to the oldster's voice, but Daisy would bet it was surprise as much as anything.

"She followed me," Daisy realized. "Didn't you?"

"We did," Alice agreed.

When Molly tore her eyes away from Luke's, and the lines of her frown shifted away from anger. Pouting, all but sticking out her lower lip; it was as good an act as anyone had ever put on.

"We come here to make sure Daisy was all right." Well, wasn't that cute. "She seemed so upset when she left and we just wasn't sure it was smart for her to drive, so we followed out after her." They must have driven blacked out, too, far enough behind that they couldn't easily be seen and Daisy was a fool. She'd led them right here. "And then this cantankerous youngster here," finger jutting at Luke, "come running at us, accusing us of sabotage and sneakiness and—doing something to Bo."

"Luke," Jesse intervened. "You said yourself that whoever it was that you was fighting with, it wasn't Molly."

"It wasn't Molly," wasn't exactly like Luke agreeing. It was more like Luke making a legal case. "But that don't mean she wasn't behind it."

"Behind what?" was Molly's defense. She turned to Jesse with all the innocence in her soul laid bare in her wide eyes. "Now, Jess, we've been friends for too long for you to go—"

"Just tell us where Bo is," Luke demanded. "And we'll—"

"Jess!" Molly protested over whatever Luke was going to offer her in exchange for Bo's location.

"Now, Luke." Jesse might have been on the verge of a lecture, but then again, his eyes were darting back and forth from Luke to Molly, like he was trying to decide which of them was more right than the other (and which might need to be taken over his knee). Not that Daisy would ever know what his intentions had really been.

"All of you, knock it off." That was Alice. It was probably the loudest Daisy had ever heard her speak. For such a strong girl, Alice wasn't one to assert herself. "It don't matter who's right and who's wrong. Only thing important here is, Bo's missing. Reckon you all need to quit your fussing and find him!"

Which was fine advice and just maybe Daisy wished she'd been the one to give it. Though it didn't much matter when the only thing they could all agree on was that not a one of them had the first idea where to start looking.


	22. Open and Shut

**Twenty-two: Open and Shut**

 _August 3, 1974_

The headache was first, at the center of everything and pushing out to the edges. Almost making it there, and then came the memories. Not many at first, just a sense of worry or fear, the instinctive need to be still and silent. To hide, but his closed eyelids were glowing pink and that didn't make sense. Last Bo knew, it had been dark. He and Luke had been waiting for a polite little ambush coming at them from the only obvious direction, and then it had shown up rudely from all the wrong places.

Fighting – he could still feel that. Bruised on just about every patch of skin he could feel. Maybe he was grateful for the numbness of the rest of him, even if it was a bit troubling to be numb anywhere at all.

Regardless, there had been fighting and he had been hurt. In more than one way, but most pressing was that drum in his head, beating out its surly dirge. He'd lost time starting somewhere around when he lost his footing, and the only question now was, how much?

Voices, closer than he wanted them to be, so he stayed still. Didn't even open his eyes because either he was hidden in the undergrowth of the forested edge of his own property, or he was in a bed, and either way, those voices were trouble. Could be bad guys, looking for another fight, or worse (so much worse) it could be Doc Petticord and his various implements of torture looking to fix whatever had gotten broken in him. Playing dead was his only option.

Except that, somewhere through the thick cotton of his pained head, there emerged an itch. Just a little one, nothing important. On his cheek. He could ignore it. It wasn't important, probably wasn't a mosquito biting him, even if it felt quite a bit like it. Being still was more important. Listening to the voices, trying to decipher the words or even figure out – the itch wasn't that bad, wasn't distracting at all. Trying to figure out who was talking and where they were and could any of those voices—

It wasn't a mosquito, wasn't sucking him dry, surely. Wasn't something worse, like a horsefly (really wasn't, those hurt instead of itched) or a flea or… it wasn't important. He could ignore it.

And go right back to listening, but there wasn't anything clearer than a mumble. Trying to get, from just that little, some idea of—

And no, it wasn't a mosquito. Too itchy, too mean and maybe it was a tick? Or chiggers or— hell, it might just be a vampire bat trying to suck him dry.

He had to scratch, that was all there was to it. Had to move even if he knew it was a bad idea, had to get his hand up to his face, and… well that was a problem, wasn't it? He couldn't find his hand. It didn't hurt; there was no sensation of it because it didn't exist, it wasn't there at all.

Against whatever might have seemed like his wiser thoughts, his eyes popped open and he barely bit back a cry – in worry over his missing hand and the assault of the light directly into his eyes. He wiggled (ow) and twisted (ugh) and tried to see (ow, ow, ow) what exactly had happened to his arms (argh). Both of them, because one was as missing as the other. It wasn't (ouch! Damn it!) easy when everything hurt, but with a little shifting this way and that (oh, that was unpleasant) he figured out that his hands weren't so much missing as tied behind him. Or underneath him. He was on his back, his shoulders were cramped, his arms ached down to his elbows and were numb everywhere south of that. Though all his writhing had started waking them up and the movement of his blood was about as comfortable as a million burning sparks singeing their way past his skin and down toward his bones.

Well, at least his face didn't itch anymore.

He wanted his hands free, figured that wasn't going to happen when they were tied to each other and then the rope went right down and wound around his feet. After that the rope went down to the frame of the cot, wait, cot? Yep, canvas under him, metal frame around that and he was hogtied to it. He shifted again, which sent more sparks firing up his arms, but allowed a better view of his immediate surroundings. Wasn't much else to see here in the room (room?) with him. A broom in the corner, a couple of cans of something that might have once been paint. It smelled, now that he thought about it, of dust and rotten leaves, and under that, just a hint of sour moonshine mash. Stains on the floor that might have been anything from oil to blood, studs showing in the walls and a door between him and whatever was on the other side. It was cracked open a bit, but there wasn't much to see through it, because it was lighter in here than out there.

The voices trickled in from somewhere on the far side of that door. He'd had a pointless moment of hope, as he'd awakened, that it would be Luke or Jesse talking. Maybe Daisy or even Rosco, but now there was no denying what he'd known all along. He wasn't on the Duke property, wasn't hiding from anyone at all. He'd been hit over the head and dragged off (or carried, and half of him wondered what that had even looked like when he wasn't exactly small, the ground hadn't been level and there'd been no light at all to speak of) to somewhere else entirely, put into a truck or a van – he could remember now, the way it bounced under him, the way he'd come to consciousness and hollered, the way he'd been hit again – tied up and laid here.

Looking up – which was the easiest thing he could have done and yet he was only getting around to it now ( _you'd take the long route to your own hind end_ , Luke would say) – he could see sky. Not everywhere, mostly he was seeing boards, sloping up toward the wall where the door was, roughhewn, stained, cracked, and at some point there had been a cave-in. Years ago, by the looks of the stalactites of unnamable goo hanging down off the sagging and broken ends of the boards. And beyond that, a tree branch breaking up a narrow view of the sky.

The voices were a little stronger now, thuds of boots getting kicked or stomped against something, someone complaining.

"It ain't exactly the Dodge Mahal," was almost a whine in a male voice. Not Luke's for sure, higher and less sure of itself. Like Cletus Hogg on one of his more confused days. "And I don't see why we got to wipe our feet when the floor ain't half there to begin with." Wasn't Cletus, though. Despite the Hogg blood in him, Cletus had manners.

"That's Taj Mahal, you idiot." And that was a woman answering back, sound cracking and wavering like someone's grandmother, except Hazzard's grandmothers weren't usually that ill-tempered. Familiar sound to her that Bo couldn't quite place. "And you'll wipe your feet because you're a damned fool who needs to be told what to do every minute of every day."

More stomping on floorboards (and if he and Luke ever wiped their feet that way in their own house, Daisy would twist their earlobes so hard they'd be purple for a week after), smell of cigarette smoke following the noise. If Bo was in a side room – which he kind of figured he must be, with the slope of the roof overhead – then he was only one room away from the main room, based on how sounds and smells carried.

"It wasn't my fault," the first voice said. "It was his."

The mean grandmother, if Bo's experience with cantankerous oldsters was anything to go by, wasn't going to be too pleased with an attempt to pass the blame on to the next guy.

"You're both idiots and I want you both to sit down and shut up," came pretty much as he predicted. Mostly; the name-calling was a little over-the-top.

By his count, that made three of them, two of whom were younger men, and the third an older woman, who might just be the most dangerous.

"But we got to check on him," one of the men whined. The other one, the one that'd been quiet up to now. He sounded every bit as mature as his companion.

"He ain't going nowhere," said grandma, and Bo had to admit that if they were talking about him, she was right. He didn't have enough play in the ropes to do anything but wiggle around like a fish in a net. "And you boys better figure out right quick what you're going to do with him, because now that you done kidnapped one of them, the rest of them are going to be combing this country from one end to the other. That Jesse Duke, he don't take too kindly to no one messing with his kin."

Bo wasn't entirely sure how to feel about those words. Yes, his family would be searching for him, and that was comforting. But the bunch of them in the other room, they seemed to know the Dukes entirely too well for people that Bo couldn't swear he'd ever properly met.

"But Aunt Ivy, you told us to get them." Ivy – the name seemed like it ought to mean something to him, but he was pretty sure he'd never known anyone who called themselves that.

"You was supposed to get their recipe, bust up their still, do whatever you had to to get them out of business. Not drag one of them back here with you like some sort of pet." Bo figured that if he were a pet, he would have been fed somewhere along the way, or at least offered water. His cracked lips went to prove otherwise, and the blood he tasted when he licked them made him one of the poorest-treated pets he'd ever known.

"He seen me," the first whiner answered back, the one who halfway sounded like Cletus. "What else was I supposed to do?"

It was an interesting assertion. Bo hadn't seen anything at all worth seeing at any point since the sun went down last night, but it wasn't like he could get up, walk into the next room and explain that to the three of them out there. Not when he was hogtied and his intentions, should anyone decide to check on the _pet_ after all, were to pretend to still be knocked out cold.

"It don't matter no more what you was supposed to do, only what you done and what we got to do now."

"What's that?"

"Get rid of him."

Oh, that reeked of trouble. Ominous words, and yet Bo's lips curled into a tight smile (that hurt, but then everything hurt and he was just going to have to get used to that). Because while the small group had been out there blabbering, he'd figured out a thing or two. Or three, if you counted his recognition that the folks that had captured him and brought him here were at least a bubble off plumb.

* * *

It was a pretty simple case, if you asked Rosco. Open and shut, but when he presented it, he got shouted down by just about everybody. Enos was respectful enough not to yell, but he looked at Rosco funny all the same.

Wasn't very nice of his deputy, considering it was Enos' fault he was here at all when he'd rather be in bed. His back was sore, his sinuses were swollen big enough that he figured his head might pop like an overfilled balloon, and he was tired. Beyond tired to the point of crabby, and it was all these Dukes' fault. Or maybe not _these_ Dukes, but _those_ Dukes, the ones that weren't here right now.

Here being, at the moment, the porch of the Duke farmhouse. Where if it wasn't cool, at least there was the slightest breeze to move the heat around a little bit. Though the sun was already far too hot for eight-thirty in the AM.

He'd gotten called out to the sticks, and he'd had to borrow his mama's car to get there. Which meant all manner of promises about what he would and would not do to it, as if she didn't trust her own son to go out for a little ride without getting into a wreck. Her car wasn't anything worth worrying over, anyway, lumbering and colicky as it was. Took him ten extra minutes to get here, because it had one gear and that was "old lady" and definitely not "cop car." Which was an insult to his dignity, but then again, his cruiser was somewhere in midst of the ten-step process of drying out after diving a little too deep in the drink just a few short hours ago.

When he'd finally gotten here, he'd been faced by the likes of Jesse Duke – who looked about as cheerful as a rattlesnake defending its den – and both of those swamp-dwelling Snodgrasses. Not to mention his deputy, who should be back at the office opening the station up for the day, but was here in the service of these no-account—

And then there was Daisy Duke, sitting a careful distance away from Enos on the porch steps, eyes red and swollen, hair a windblown mess, and looking just as sad and innocent as anybody's little girl ever had. She was the only reason Rosco had any sympathy for anything at all that was happening here.

Bo Duke was missing. That had been the one thing that everyone could agree on, Jesse with his hands rubbing against the knees of his overalls, Daisy with shaky fingers through her hair, Alice Snodgrass with alligator tears if ever he'd seen any before in his life.

From there, the stories diverged into a jumbled mess that had Bo disappearing sometime in the night. Which didn't make sense, because why hadn't the Dukes called him earlier if one of their own was missing? Why wait until morning?

Then again, Rosco had been kind of busy last night, chasing down a speeding van and getting an unscheduled bath for himself and his cruiser (which might have been a bit dirty, but it didn't need quite such a thorough cleaning), discovering that his police radio had failed to survive the submersion and slogging out of the pond and down the road until he got to the first phone. Which was at the Collins' farm and Buck Collins hadn't exactly been thrilled to see a pair of soggy lawmen at his door in the middle of the night, but he'd agreed to let Enos use his phone anyway because he liked the Strates (and never had lost any love on Coltranes).

Enos had called the Davenports, who had taken their sweet time in sending out Cooter to pull the cruiser from the pond. Back where they started, Rosco had watched in sodden mortification until the only car that the county still owned was on dry land again. Buck Collins had driven Enos back to his boarding house but Rosco had been made to endure the loud and somewhat smelly company of a far too amused Cooter Davenport as he towed the vehicle back to town and pronounced it all but dead. "She ain't going nowhere for a few days," was all the fool had to say on the subject. Then he'd whistled some jolly little tune, hopped into his sporty car to head back to home and bed. Rosco made the soggy walk over to the courthouse where he had some civilian clothes that had been in his locker for years. They might have been a bit wrinkled and just a tad small, but they were dry, and when he got to his mama's house somewhere around three in the morning, at least he wasn't dripping on her floor.

Sleep had been short and fitful, and even the sun wasn't fully awake when Enos' telephone call tracked him down to say that he was needed at the Duke farm right quick.

Making the bunch of them hush while each person told their tale of the night before might have kept the timbers of the old porch from rumbling down on them with the din disagreeing voices, but it hadn't clarified the actual events one bit. Every story started with a bunch of fiddle-faddle about the Dukes pulling a fool scheme to try to catch whoever had burned their barn (and Rosco figured old J.D. Hogg had a point there – the Dukes had done it to themselves) and chased them in the night (which was either revenuers or Rosco himself) and damaged their crops (again, the Dukes had done it themselves with the help of those Snodgrasses, no doubt).

And though the middles differed, the stories all ended the same, too. Bo Duke was missing, taken away by persons unknown. Meanwhile, it was as plain as the nose on Enos' face (which was a pretty plain affair if you asked Rosco, but Daisy Duke kept on stealing glances at him when she figured Enos wasn't looking, so she must have figured he was at least all-right-looking) that Luke Duke wasn't anywhere to be seen. Which led to the obvious conclusion.

Luke had kidnapped Bo.

Oh, but not a one of the people gathered on the porch was willing to admit that Rosco had solved the case as easily as that. There was squeaking and squawking and all sorts of complaining, Enos getting that look on his face like maybe he needed an outhouse right quick. Molly Snodgrass saying she'd told them all that the law wouldn't be of any help, Alice mumbling something about Bo's virtue and Daisy looking at Enos like maybe he wasn't her knight in shining armor after all.

(Of course not, he was the county's scapegoat in blue – hell, that was all lawmen were anymore. Not like in the good old days when people respected a badge. At least Rosco had heard tell that they did. Hadn't ever happened over the course of his life in law enforcement.)

And somewhere in the middle of Rosco's nostalgia for a time he hadn't even known firsthand, Jesse Duke pulled himself up from the beaten down old chair he'd been sitting in. His broad hands got rubbed against the bib of his overalls, even if there was no way they were dirty, and he shrugged away Molly Snodgrass's attempt to pull him back down or comfort him or whatever her hand in the crook of his elbow was trying to do. He stepped past her, past Alice and Daisy and Enos on the stairs, and walked across the dust of his own farmyard to the open window of his pickup truck, offering Rosco a mean little glower the whole way.

"This is Jesse Duke," he said into the CB microphone that he strung out the window. "Calling Luke Duke, come back."

Rosco opened his mouth with intent to say something about – well, it was something important, he was sure, but he forgot whatever it was when Jesse pointed a finger at him, telling him with just that little that hushing up would be his best bet right now. Whatever Rosco had meant to say came out sounding considerably less intelligent than he might have hoped. "Gij-gyu," was about the extent of it.

"Luke Duke, this is Jesse Duke, and you'd best answer me, boy." Old Jesse's face was a warm shade of red that looked every bit like a young boy's whipped hind end.

* * *

 _You ain't so big that I can't still tan your hide._

Those would have been Jesse's next words, but Luke was smart enough not to let them get said.

"I'm right here," he mumbled into _Tilly_ 's CB. And he was, too, most likely closer than Jesse thought.

They'd left him, in those hours before the sun rose. After what remained of his family, along with Molly and Alice, had assured themselves that Bo wasn't anywhere to be found on the hillside, Jesse had declared it time to go home. To recoup, to regroup, to figure out next steps.

But Luke didn't need to do that, didn't need rest, either. And figuring out next steps, well, he'd so brilliantly figured out all the ones that had led them here so maybe it was for the best that he left the rest of the figuring to other people.

"I ain't leaving here until I find Bo," he'd declared.

Jesse had been riled, oh, he'd been plenty upset and he'd called Luke any derogatory name he could come up with (but they were all pretty tame compared to what Marines called each other on a normal day). He'd offered to whip him right there and then, he'd told Luke to mind him, he'd even grabbed hold of him by the elbow like he meant to drag him home by force, while Daisy watched the whole thing with eyes popped wide as an owl's at midnight.

Luke had refused to come and it had started to look like one of those pointless standoffs, dumb as playing chicken on a narrow bridge. Finally Luke had huffed, run his hand through his hair and gotten real honest. About how it was his fault Bo was missing to begin with, and he just couldn't go home and sit and think, he had to stay here until first light and see if he could find anything at all that would lead them to his lost cousin. Jesse hadn't liked it, but he'd understood. He'd left a flashlight and instructions not to be a fool and not to get hurt and not to this or that. He'd hushed Daisy when she complained that Luke was bleeding from what wasn't anything more than a split lip, and sent her on down to the pickup she'd brought here. Then he'd gone and roused Molly and Alice from the stump where they'd been sitting and alternately pouting and worrying, but mostly being useless. Sent them off in their pickup, then he and Luke had slowly climbed back to where the fire still burned low in the old stone fireplace, and Luke had helped his uncle onto Maudine's back. Offered up the flashlight to guide their way back to the farmhouse, but Jesse had laughed at him.

"I been finding my way through the dark since before you was born, boy. Reckon between us, me and Maudine ain't so addle-brained that you got to worry about us." Then he'd put his hand on Luke's head, so he'd look up at him. "I know you got to do what you got to do, Luke, and I reckon if there's anyone who can figure out what happened here tonight, it's you. I just want you to promise me that you won't stay out here past the point where it's doing any good. You feel bad, I know, but it wasn't your fault. It wasn't nobody's fault but the ones that done it. Don't punish yourself." And then the hand had fallen away, and man and beast had trundled slowly off over the crest of the hill.

It was easy for Jesse to say it wasn't anyone's fault that Bo was what – gone? hurt? beaten and kidnapped? each thought was worse than the previous – when Jesse hadn't been the one to come up with the wonderful plan in the first place. Whatever had happened to Bo, it was Luke's fault. He could accept that.

What he couldn't accept was that, come light of day, there wasn't a lot more to see than there had been in the dark. Displaced leaves, sure. Enough to show that there had been a fight, but not enough to explain where Bo had gone. Whatever his cousin was, he wasn't small, and getting him out of here couldn't have been easy. There ought to have been some sort of sign of how it got done. But there wasn't, so Luke went down to the lane at the bottom of the hill and sure enough, there were tire tracks. Some of them probably belonged to whatever getaway car the bad guys had used, but all of them disappeared once the sandy shoulder gave way to the hardpan of the road. Not enough rain lately to make mud, which left him with no trail to follow. None whatsoever.

Uncle Jesse would have been proud to know that Luke hadn't stayed there at the site of his fabulous blunder of a plan for long after the sun rose. There hadn't been anything worth staying for, so he'd gotten into _Tilly_ and driven off. Thought about how it was only hours ago that he and Bo were in the car together, how they'd joked and bantered, and then he'd slammed his hand against the steering wheel as hard as he could. Didn't help anything, but he did it a second time, just for good measure.

Hands, Bo's hands. They'd been burned not all that long ago. Wrapped in gauze for more than a week and then they'd been itchy and tender all at once, with that new skin replacing the old, and how could Luke have forgotten? Or not forgotten, just – believed Bo when he acted like they were okay now. Bought into the whole idea that his cousin was just fine when in truth he was compromised and not in any condition to be fighting like he had been last night, that was for sure.

 _Nobody's fault._

It was all Luke's fault.

He couldn't go home. Couldn't look at Bo's bed, made just as sloppily as he could get away with, couldn't go into the bathroom and smell the aftershave that his cousin had taken to wearing in layers thick enough to knock out a bull. Couldn't face Jesse and Daisy and tell them he hadn't found a single thing worth finding, couldn't face Molly and Alice without wanting to interrogate them within inches of their lives because he couldn't quite accept their innocence.

So he'd made his way up onto Settler's Ridge to the clearing that overlooked the farm, and sat there with Tilly's engine idling. Wasting gas, stewing. Watching Enos show up in his father's sedan, knocking on the door. Getting let in, then a few minutes later he and Jesse came back out and stood on the porch, mouth moving and hands gesturing. The women followed, carrying coffee and biscuits, and everyone settled and sat around on the porch, talking.

Luke wanted to be down there with everything in him. To be amongst friends and family. To find some comfort there, but he couldn't. He wouldn't go home, not without Bo.

After a while, Rosco had lumbered up Old Mill Road in his mother's unfortunate Packard, ancient enough that it might as well have been dug up in Egypt as an artifact. Black and white and rusted all over, it was the punch line to the world's least funny joke. Rosco climbed out, stood in front of the assembled group and twitched and itched like only Rosco would. After a while, Jesse worked his heavy way up to his feet and all but stomped to the pickup, then that call came.

 _You'd best answer me, boy._

 _I'm right here._ Watching you from up on the hill, but he couldn't say that last part. Not when he didn't want to face any of them until he'd righted everything that he'd made wrong.

"Uh, Luke," it was funny how Jesse could command the airwaves in one second, then stumble around them in the next. "Rosco here's got something he wants to say to you."

"Ij!" That wasn't supposed to be broadcast at all, Luke figured. From the way Rosco was backing away and Jesse was gesturing, it seemed like the sheriff had found himself in the spotlight and was saddled with an ugly case of stage fright. "Now, Jesse, I—jit!"

And then, muffled by a hand over the microphone (but the button was still depressed, go figure), there was Jesse's, "Now Rosco, I figure Luke's got a right to know about this great theory of yours."

He couldn't swear he was in a hurry to hear anything the sheriff had to say, unless it was that he had arrested J.D. Hogg and was having him thoroughly interrogated about his part in the disappearance of Bo Duke.

"All right, just—just give me that, Jesse Duke. I'm the law around here and I'll say who talks to who and when…" There was more, but only half of it was decipherable, and the rest was pointless anyway. Until, finally, Rosco had control of the microphone and himself. "Luke, just tell me what you saw last night."

Oh, hell. This again.

"I didn't see nothing." It was the same story he'd been telling all night. "Or not much, anyways. Mostly I felt punches and shoving," and he felt himself getting thrown to the ground a few times, too, but that wasn't important. "Heard some voices, none of which was familiar," except Bo's and Jesse's when each of them cried out. But saying that to Rosco would only manage to confuse him even worse than usual. "As to seeing, there was only one of them I saw and he was moving pretty quick." It was too dark to pick out any details, so he couldn't say anything about hair or eye color. "He was big, but not as big as Bo." And Luke had hurt him, he was pretty sure. "I was headed up to check on Jesse, so I couldn't chase after him, but he was limping away when I saw him. Or running funny, anyways. That's all I can tell you."

"And what exactly was you doing when Bo disappeared?"

Now _that_ sounded like an accusation. From where Luke sat, he could see the slump of Rosco's shoulders. Jesse was standing close to him, hands on his hips like some kind of schoolmarm making him recite his lessons, and Daisy, over on the porch, was getting to her feet.

"Fighting with the guys that took him."

"And just how do you know it was guys?"

It _was_ an accusation. Rosco sounded far too proud of himself. And Daisy was coming off the porch, advancing like she meant it. Like she thought maybe Rosco's head would look better if it had a frying-pan shaped lump on it. (And the sheriff didn't know how lucky he was that her hands were empty.)

"Because there ain't no woman could carry Bo out of there."

It should have been funny. Would have been, if Bo were up here in the ridge with him, listening to Rosco's fool allegations and watching how he was about to be decked by the skinniest girl in Hazzard.

But it wasn't funny, because he had no idea where Bo was. None at all, and he didn't know if his cousin was hurt or… or worse. It wasn't funny because Luke was fully aware of what everyone else seemed to have forgotten.

Today was Bo's damned birthday. Eighteen years old, finally old enough to drink an honest beer, and he was gone.

Luke tossed the CB mic into the empty seat next to him, put his foot on the accelerator and drove away.


	23. Half Thoughts and a Whole Lotta Trouble

**Twenty-three: Half Thoughts and a Whole Lotta Trouble  
**

 _August 3, 1974_

"Wait a minute."

The words were such a quiet counterpoint to the blood throbbing through her ears, to the murderous red of Jesse's face. Thoughtful tone breaking into a world that was beyond reason, into a world where anyone at all (even Rosco Coltrane, who wasn't always known for his clear-thinking ways) could seriously consider that Luke would hurt Bo.

"Wait a minute!" The first one could have been ignored. The second one made her stop, turn and look back. At Enos, whose face was changing from knit-browed confusion to glowing realization. Something was coming to him. Slowly, and Daisy, of all people, ought to know that it was best to wait it out. To give him the time he needed to get where he was going.

But she didn't like it, the way he was over there rationally thinking things through when the world around them was flowers-in-the-sky, clouds-on-the-ground upside-down. Bo was missing and Rosco was accusing Luke, who was off on his own, all but daring whoever it was that had taken Bo to come and get him next… and Enos was listening to his head and not his heart. The same as he must have been doing when he arrested her cousins a few nights back.

Rosco didn't much like it, either. His eyebrows were low under the brim of his hat, and he was sputtering into the CB and the people around him all at once. Something about how he didn't need to wait no minute and Luke Duke had best answer him right now, because he was the sheriff in these parts. Jesse was trying to take the CB microphone back and there was a ridiculous scuffle going on between them. Molly was on her feet, ready to jump right into the fray (either to protect Jesse or to help thwart the law, she wasn't the picky sort) while Alice was disruptive just by being Alice. And Enos sat still through it all, thinking his thoughts.

"Wait a minute!" Enos said one more time and maybe it was the repetition, maybe it exasperation over how he kept asking them for a minute when none of them had one to spare. Or maybe it was just the insistence with which it was said, but Enos had their attention now. "Luke said he ran funny, didn't he?"

"Enos! Can't you see I'm trying to—" Rosco's patience, never his long suit, was shorter than a Marine recruit's first haircut. Especially when Enos' face lit up brightly with a realization that hadn't yet come to Rosco. Or any of the rest of them, but most were willing to listen. "And Luke don't run funny."

"No, not Luke, whoever it was that ran off in the middle of the fight, around when Bo disappeared." Fortunately, Enos was far too earnest to even notice, much less be insulted by, Rosco's exasperation. "And Daisy, didn't you say that one of them boys who broke in here the other night—"

"Tiddly-tuddly," Rosco mumbled. Jesse snatched the CB microphone back from him and leveled him with one of those glares that he used on his boys when they came in late, smelling of a girl's perfume mixed with the powder from her daddy's gun.

"Didn't you say one of them ran with a limp?"

"Well, he didn't run normal," Daisy agreed, though she wouldn't call it exactly a limp.

Enos nodded anyway, standing up slowly, tripping through the fog of his thoughts. "And do you remember July Fourth?"

The question was a sucker punch, hitting her low and mean. Heck yes, she remembered July Fourth. Hard to believe it was barely a month ago that her biggest concerns had been the length of her hair and whether Enos would show up at the festivities. She could remember the way her heart stopped for a second, then had to race to catch up with itself when he finally arrived at her side, when they walked together and looked over the gathering of picnickers and at the games…

"Velma's cousin!" she shouted. In some sort of a foot race, she couldn't remember exactly what kind, but she could still see the way he ran, all pigeon-toed, and the way she and Enos had laughed at his gait. He'd been able to move plenty quick, too.

"Jeremy."

"Jeremy?" Daisy was trying to remember if she'd ever known Velma's cousins' names, wondering how Enos could know them when as far as Daisy knew, Velma had never been even a little friendly toward him. "What are you talking about?"

But Enos didn't answer her, just stumbled over his own feet down the stairs, as though thinking and walking all at once was too much for him. Then he marched over to Uncle Jesse's pickup and held out his hand. As though he expected Jesse to hand over the CB microphone when the oldster had only just won a tug-of-war with Rosco over it.

"We need to call Cooter," Enos explained.

* * *

These had to be the dumbest bunch of criminals Bo had ever seen.

And, yes, now he'd seen them. Or most of them, anyway, and they hadn't tried to hide their faces or conceal their identities. But then again, they'd made pretty clear that they intended to kill him. They were dumb but they were coldblooded.

He had, without precise intent to do so, joined them in the main room of the cabin. Looked about the same as it had years ago when he and Luke had explored it as young hunters.

That was the secret he kept from them, and the reason he'd bothered to let them know he was awake at all. He knew exactly where he was, and all he needed was to be free and to get himself a running head start and he'd be fine. Mostly, anyway, as long his lead was a good one. One that was faster than a bullet.

The shiny noses of guns, that was how he'd been introduced to his captors. That was what first entered the side room where he'd lain, after he'd set to hollering. When the rest of the guns made it in, followed by pair of yellow-bellied cowards that would threaten to shoot a man who was tied down to a cot (that was so light weight that Bo might have gotten to his feet without being untied, but he wouldn't have gotten far trying to run with a cot on his back), he decided that maybe he'd been better off before they knew he was awake. Too late, so he went forward with his plan. Which wasn't so much a plan as something better to do than lay around, waiting to be killed.

It was the hole in the roof that had done it, maybe he'd even remembered the cot and the paint cans. The angles were all different now — he wasn't a kid and he'd been on his feet and free to move around back then — but otherwise it was much the same as it had been maybe eight or tens years earlier. When he and Luke had chased a deer further than they should have and crossed over into parts of the woods they'd never known before. They'd found this place and abandoned hunting long enough to explore it. To declare it their "fort" but when they'd described it to Jesse later, he'd scolded them. _Stay off of other people's property_ , he'd said. _Even if it don't look like it belongs to nobody, it belongs to somebody, and that somebody ain't you._

And apparently it did belong to somebody, after all. Now it was up to Bo to figure out who.

Needing to use the bathroom had been his excuse for bring them into the side room. It hadn't worked out like he'd hoped, because the cabin (which was more of a shack) had no indoor plumbing, and the two goons who had come to check on the noise figured there was no reason he couldn't just wet his pants.

But they'd relented all the same. Hadn't so much untied all his limbs as just released him from the cot's frame. They'd given him enough slack to stand, then when his legs stopped wobbling around like a newborn colt's, they'd given him enough rope to walk. He'd been led through the main section of the cabin and then outside where, as shaky as his legs were – and given the fact that there was still a loosely tied rope between them like makeshift leg irons – there was no chance of him outrunning a turtle, let alone a bullet. When it came time to relieve himself he had no privacy at all. The second his hands were untied to do exactly what he needed to and nothing more, there was cold metal pressed against his temple until he was done. He didn't like how that felt, but he figured a bullet would feel even worse, so he left it alone and let himself be herded back inside. Never mind that he hadn't managed to properly relieve himself with two guys watching his every move.

Four walls around him had made him bolder. Or maybe it was the woman who was puttering around an old coal stove that wasn't lit or presently in use in any way that he could figure, but seemed perfectly natural standing there all the same. Just like anyone's grandmother, though she was dressed in jeans and a flannel camping shirt, rather than the floral dress that might have been expected. Her gray hair curled around her ears and on her forehead, and it wouldn't have been any kind of surprise at all if there had been a tray of gingerbread cookies in her hand.

She didn't smile at him, more like smirked, but that wasn't important. The way the men at his sides stiffened when she looked at them, that was what mattered. She was in charge. And Bo had never in his life met a woman that he couldn't sway over to his way of seeing things.

So when the guys tried to herd him back into that side room, he refused to go. That gun that had been against his temple earlier seemed a lot less sure of itself now, kind of wavering in the air like it didn't know whether or not to threaten. Bo said he was sick of lying on his back. Ran his hands awkwardly through his hair to the back of his head where there was a stone-like knot standing out in relief, and the sticky feeling of blood. Complained of a headache and got himself shoved into a poorly stuffed, musty and somewhat crooked old armchair in the main room. Something as left over from better times as every other part of this cabin seemed to be.

The ropes bit into his wrists and ankles when the knots that bound him were retied and tightened, but complaining about that only seemed to encourage increasingly violent tugs on the rope, so he shut his mouth and let it be. At least his hands were in front of him this time, even if the knots were ugly twists that were worthy of Luke, and the rope was looped around the width of his shoulders and the back of the chair a few times, just for good measure.

"You sure are a handsome fellow," said the woman, who must have been Aunt Ivy, as the last knot was completed and testing tug on the ropes was performed. He was handsome and he was stuck here.

Then there was nothing but time, not much to do but get a real good look at his captors. To study the two men, who had the kind of familiar faces that everyone in these parts had. Descendants of one local forefather or another, and the underslung jaws on these two were common enough around the tri-county region. They could be brothers or cousins or even more distant relatives than that, and just because Bo had this feeling he'd seen them before didn't mean that he actually had. They were both plain enough, with varying shades of brown to their hair and muscular bodies that weren't all that different from any other farm boy's. The guns that lent them bravado might have been the only thing that marked them as dumber than the average tri-county boy.

"Your uncle was handsome too," Aunt Ivy assured him after she'd glared at the two goons into submission. They'd sat in a tired pair of chairs that someone's great-grandpa had probably whittled out of an old oak tree, and laid their guns on what might pass for a rough-hewn table made by kids. Lopsided and nailed together out of scraps, but that didn't stop the fools from putting their elbows on it, though there was little chance it could tolerate the abuse. "When he was your age."

"Thank you ma'am," he answered because she was central to whatever had led to him being here, but she was still a woman. Someone's grandmother (maybe, and if not, she should be) and he'd been taught his manners. And also because she'd given him just the smallest piece of information. "Reckon he'd say you was a fetching woman, too." Exactly like that – fetching. A word no self-respecting man under the age of fifty would use.

She blushed – that was useful to know, too.

"Of course, looks ain't everything," she informed him, just like every schoolmarm before her had. Sighed in that same way that meant that his looks were enough, anyway, to keep him from flunking out. Which was good, because he had a feeling that failing this particular class would get him killed.

"Aunt Ivy," growled by one of the guys went to prove that age-old lesson that succeeding with women usually meant alienating other men.

"Hush," she answered back like he was nothing more than a mosquito whining in her ears. "Why don't you go out and see if you can reach Velma."

"But the van's all the way down by the road." Van – so there were wheels nearby. Which made sense. He had hazy memories being driven somewhere, after all. Besides, even if these boys looked strong enough, they couldn't have carried him very far. The road, well. He really didn't know the roads in this area in any kind of detail. When he and Luke had come here it had been after an endless hike from… it was too long ago to remember. Far enough away that his legs had hurt. (Luke would know, though. Luke had an uncanny sense of direction, even as a kid. Too bad he wasn't Luke.)

All the same, if he could figure out where the road was, and he could get to the van, he'd be free. He'd never met a vehicle that he couldn't hotwire, then drive faster than the wind could blow.

"Unless you figure you can string a phone line up here, I don't see no other way to reach her. Y'all boys," and the other one groaned. "Best go on down there and try calling her on that CB."

A glare settled between the two men, and that was one more useful piece of information.

"Go on," Ivy prodded, taking the three steps from the stove over to the table and looking down at the pair of them with pursed lips and lowered eyebrows, every bit as stern as Uncle Jesse telling him and Luke to get to the chores. "I can take care of him."

One of the boys smacked the other on the back of the head as he got to his feet. Ivy didn't scold or even glower – she smirked. The other boy also stood and reached for his gun.

"Leave that here, Jeremy," Ivy said. "You too, Kevin. I don't need you boys shooting each other."

Watching the three of them was like playing poker with Enos. You could win every time because there were far too many tells. Enos was smart, he learned way back when they were kids not to play games that required him to mask his emotions. These folks were dumb, playing for high stakes and then giving away all of their weaknesses like little Christmas presents, wrapped especially for Bo.

The boys grumbled on their way to the door, one with a sour glance over his shoulder and the other with his head down and his feet taking short, pigeon-toed steps. Then they were gone, and Bo was left with Ivy.

"So," she said, pulling the chair that Jeremy had just vacated in a little circle so it faced Bo. Sitting down, then picking up one of the guns. Holding it in both hands, but not pointing it at Bo. Leaning forward and letting it droop casually between her knees, and offering up a wink that made his guts twist. "Tell me about your Uncle Jesse."

* * *

Enos was too big for his britches. Jesse Duke was, too, but he hadn't sworn any oaths. At least none Rosco knew about, and if he had, they certainly weren't in loyalty to the Hazzard Sheriff's Department. Jesse Duke was a nuisance, an ongoing pain in Rosco's hind quarters, but Enos – Enos should have known better.

"This is Deputy Enos Strate calling Cooter Davenport." Jesse Duke had taken that same CB that he had so rudely yanked from Rosco's hand and handed it over to Enos, gentle as a lamb.

"Try again," Jesse encouraged when the silence on the other end of the CB dragged on too long. Enos nodded like Jesse was his papa and had just given him that whole bunch of baloney about how if at first you didn't succeed…

"Cooter Davenport, are you out there, buddyroe?"

"Enos!" Rosco was on the verge of reminding the boy about radio protocol and professional law enforcement behavior when the receiver spit and sputtered and crackled to life.

"This is Crazy Cooter, coming back atcha," and that was exactly the kind of flim-flammery that Rosco wanted to keep his deputy away from. Too much time talking to Cooter and he'd be calling himself _Eager Enos_ or some-such silliness. "But now ain't a good time, buddy. We're a mite busy here and my daddy's on the warpath because the help didn't show up this morning," he added, louder, over the sound of a hydraulic something-or-other that he must have been standing awfully close to. "Best you don't call me until later – I reckon it'll be a bit before we get to fixing up that squad car your boss made such a mess of last night."

There had to be a reason Rosco could arrest Cooter Davenport and keep him in the slammer for a couple of days. An old warrant, an unpaid parking ticket, heck, maybe he could bring him in on a 332 – littering in public – because most days the mechanic was dirtier than any trash you could find on the ground.

Jesse Duke snatched the microphone back out of Enos' hand. "Cooter Davenport, you just hush up," he was scolding, windblown hair around a pink face with a jutted chin. Jesse was just this side of feral. "And you just listen and show some respect when a lawman talks to you."

Rosco really did need to get himself some Q-Tips next time he was in town and give his ears a good cleaning. Maybe they were still full of pond water, but he could have sworn he'd just heard Jesse Duke defending a lawman.

"Yes, sir," came back meekly, as though Cooter could see Jesse's dark stare right through the CB frequency. (Probably went through the lines like an electrical shock.)

The old sourpuss kept hold of the CB, but pushed the button and held it up for Enos to talk.

"Cooter, who's them two fellers that your daddy hired this summer? The ones that's cousins with Velma from the ice cream stand?" Jesse Duke cocked up an eyebrow at that. Rosco didn't know what the grumpy old bear was so impressed by – seemed to him like his deputy spent too much time goofing off around the garage and the ice cream stand instead of working.

"I told you, they didn't show this A of M," came back over the airwaves with exasperation that announced that this had all been perfectly clearly explained already. Except for how it hadn't. "Jeremy and Kevin."

Jesse shrugged at that. Daisy Duke, who had come down off the porch to stand close to where her uncle and Enos were huddled together, added her own shrug onto the mix. Which went to prove than none of them knew anything, and all of this was a wild goose chase. A stupid waste of time that could have been better spent in bed.

"They ain't showed up, you said?" But Jesse Duke was interested in that part. "You know where they live?"

"Somewheres over in Placid." Well, that was specific. And why did it even matter? What did it have to do with anything at all when they were supposed to be looking for Bo Duke, who, if he hadn't been kidnapped by Luke Duke, had probably kidnapped himself? "They's nephews of that library lady. The one that came here from Chickasaw and took over a while back. Miss Ivy."

"Ivy?" Jesse said back into the CB.

Funny if Molly Snodgrass didn't get herself up off the porch steps and onto her feet. "Ivy?" she echoed and her eyes locked with Jesse's. "Could it be?"

Jesse's mouth twisted, white whiskers pointing out at odd angles. "It's been decades."

Molly shrugged back at him. "Some things don't never go away."

"What?" Rosco asked. It was about time someone explained to him exactly why he was standing here listening to half thoughts instead of sleeping in his bed and dreaming whole dreams.

"Mrs. Young, from the library? What's she got to do with anything?"

"Young?" Jesse asked, that twist to his lips getting tighter, or maybe just more wrinkles were forming.

"A girl can get married," Molly said to him. "If the right man will have her."

Jesse rolled his eyes at her. "Seems to me that men who got involved with the likes of her ended up the worse for wear." Then he turned his attention to the CB again, and realized with a shake of his head that he'd had the button pressed in all along. "Cooter, what did you say them two boys' last name was?"

"I didn't," Cooter answered, then he hollered something. The hydraulic thig-a-ma-jig stopped for a few seconds, and more hollering happened, then the noise started up again. "Pa says their last name's Culpepper," Cooter said into the mic.

"Well, I'll be," Jesse mumbled, looking up at the sky, but there wasn't anything up there except blue. And the sun getting up higher every second, plus maybe a bird or two. "Thank you Cooter," Jesse said into the mic and Rosco blinked a bunch because he'd been staring at the sky too long.

"Poison Ivy," Molly said followed by a solid nod.

"Poison Ivy," Jesse agreed, shaking his head in wonder.

"Poison what now?" But everyone ignored Rosco's question. Molly and Jesse were having some sort of silent conversation with just their eyes, Daisy was looking from one of them to the other, and Enos had pulled off his hat and was scratching the back of his head, like he could stir thoughts to life that way. Alice had gotten to her feet and moved a little closer to the conversation, head tilted to the side like a puppy.

Whatever discussion was happening between the two older folks came to its end, and Jesse rediscovered the open microphone in his hand.

"Cooter, it sure would help us if you could shake yourself free. Bo's in trouble with some real bad folks, and we need all the help we can get. We'll meet you on the far side of Black Ridge. There's an old still site out there that we need to check out." He let go of the button with firm deliberateness.

"I'll see what I can do, Uncle Jesse."

And before Jesse could launch into his usual speech about he wasn't Cooter's uncle, another voice crackled over the airwaves.

"I'm on my way out there too." If it wasn't old Luke Duke, who'd been playing possum up to now.

"Luke," Jesse hollered into the microphone. "You just wait for the rest of us, you hear me? Luke?"

But the boy had gone silent again.


	24. Dangerous with a Big, Black D

**Twenty-four: Dangerous with a Big, Black D**

 _August 3, 1974_

It was Luke's fault. She'd swear to that later. Luke had said he was off to Black Ridge, and then refused to answer any other calls on the CB. Jesse had moved quickly after that. Just—

"Follow me!"

—and the pickup's door was yanked open with a screech of complaint.

Or maybe it was Enos' fault. (But she didn't really want it to be. So much was already Enos' fault and besides, Luke was easier to think about.)

"Daisy," Enos said, distracting her from what she wanted to do. Which was to run for the passenger side her uncle's truck and hop in. "Reckon it's best if you stay behind, now. This could get ugly and I couldn't live with myself if anything ever happened to you."

Jesse's engine started; Molly was moving toward the passenger door. Heck, even Rosco had some worthwhile forward momentum, but Daisy and Enos were stuck where they were. Frozen to bare patches of the farmyard while the world moved and changed around them. Doors slamming and engines revving.

"I can look out for myself," she said, her face hotter than the morning sun. Her hair was in her eyes and she shoved it back with something close to violence. Tangles caught in her fingers and it hurt. "Bo's my cousin," was some kind of accusation. About love and trust, and things she didn't have time to work out. "I'm going."

"Daisy," Enos complained, but she already had him by the elbow. Propelling him toward his father's car, and all she really meant to do was deposit him there, then run back to Uncle Jesse. But Molly had taken up residence in the passenger side of the bench seat and Jesse was waving out his window as the pickup started to roll. So Daisy shoved Enos into his father's car, then across the bench seat just far enough so she could hop in and get behind the wheel herself. It wasn't exactly comfortable, half on his lap, half on the vinyl seat, but she could reach the pedals and the key was right there under her hand. The engine was coughing to life and they were moving before she had a lot of time to think about what she was doing.

Jerking forward through the dust that Jesse was leaving behind and Enos let out a squeak of surprise as she shifted roughly into second. Little jerk when the car took a heartbeat or two to catch up to her intentions, while Enos started squirming out from underneath her.

"Daisy," he tried.

"Now Enos," she cut him off. "I ain't got time to argue with you. Bo's already in trouble and Luke's headed that way, too. We're going after them, and I'm driving."

If Enos had an answer to that she didn't hear it.

* * *

It was simple, really. Uncle Jesse had wasted a couple of precious minutes insisting that Luke wait for reinforcements, followed by barked demands that he acknowledge his obedience over the CB airwaves.

Luke came from a good family, no one could argue with that. Their hearts were in the wrong place though – always on their sleeves – at least when it came to this sort of thing. When it came to trouble. When it came to Bo.

Adorable kid that he'd always been, charmer with a big smile and far too much blond hair for anyone's good, Bo was the link that made everyone's chain weak. Not that Bo himself was the problem – he'd always been able to handle himself better than most people gave him credit for – just, things tended to go awry because of how everyone felt about him.

(Luke included. It was Bo's damn birthday and where was the boy? In the hands of vengeful old Duke family competitor, that was where.)

Felt strange to be driving _Tilly_ out in the broad morning light, but then again, maybe she had as much of a say in the outcome of this as any of the rest of them. She was a moonshine runner known for her speed and craftiness and her ability to just about disappear into thin air, and it was Bo who could coax the best out of her. In his hands she wasn't just great, she was legendary, and she probably wanted him back as much as any of them did. But she could be impartial about it, straightforward. She wasn't shedding any tears or begging Luke to be careful or to wait for anything at all. She was just rumbling underneath him, complicit in his radio silence and taking him where he needed to go as fast as she could roll.

Poison Ivy, that was the name that had sailed over the CB airwaves, and she was dangerous with a big, black D. Luke had heard all about her in his scab-kneed youth. So had Bo, but that boy never was much of a student. Didn't retain anything that wasn't a girl's name and number, never did a lick of math except to figure out how long it was until lunch.

But back in the days when sitting on the couch meant swinging his legs because they were too short to reach the ground (and that meant getting pulled onto Jesse's lap to make him be still) Luke used to get an earful about the Reaper (who was Thaddeus Reape by day) and Poison Ivy, and how the two of them had banded together and tried to form their own tri-county moonshine syndicate. They'd been ruthless and dirty, eliminating competition by any means necessary. They'd chased old Evan McCarthy right off of Dead Man's Cliff by impersonating revenuers in a simple black sedan. They intimidated customers into buying only from them, but their still was built out of an old Ford radiator, so their moonshine wasn't safe to drink. Not that it mattered when all they wanted was the money their wares could bring in, and if folks didn't want to buy, Poison Ivy would send her brothers out to collect a "tax" all the same. And wise men were right to be afraid of her. Jesse always said she'd buried far too many husbands for them all to be natural deaths.

Jesse had formed a coalition amongst some of the more honest moonshiners – Henstep and Sunshine and old Hard Luck, those were the first ones. Then later on Swamp Molly had joined, then Newtie, and finally, J.D. Hogg.

From there the details got fuzzy. Jesse always said little pitchers had big ears. Must have been talking about Bo, but it didn't matter, because that part of the story didn't get told in its full glory. All Luke knew for sure was that Jesse came up with a plan with which J.D. Hogg didn't agree, but the democratic vote went Jesse's way. And the plan had worked well enough that The Reaper and Poison Ivy had been caught by the state police and tried for their crimes.

The Reaper turned on Ivy and got a plea deal for 10 years, but only served five of it before his heart gave out. Poison Ivy got put away for a long time – that was how the tale was always told, and that was all Luke knew. Molly had gone back to the swamp, everyone else had picked up their businesses where they left off, and with the threat of the Reaper and Ivy gone, J.D. Hogg had tried a few tricks of his own and plummeted out of favor with Jesse.

All those tales had fallen away years ago, when Lavinia died and Jesse mellowed and there were more pressing problems to worry about.

But now, for whatever reason, Jesse thought Ivy was the one who'd kidnapped Bo. The family and all the friends they could scrape together on short notice were headed up to Black Ridge (and that explained why he and Bo had just about gotten their hides tanned that time they'd "discovered" that old shack up there and turned it into a one-day hideout) to rescue him. But none of them were in the right frame of mind to do it. They were angry and upset and worried, and they were fools.

Luke cleared his head of all the thoughts that didn't matter. About the past, about the way it had left him with so dang little, and even that much he'd had to hold onto with both hands and fight, kick and scratch for or it'd slip away. About how Bo could twist his stomach up in boatswain's knots with as little as a scraped knee, about how his cousin never had been known for holding his temper and if Poison Ivy and any goons she might have hired had threatened or even just annoyed him, Bo's mouth had probably dug him into the deep mud. Lord knew, he could be bleeding and broken. He could have a few bullet holes in him by now.

But Luke wasn't going to think about that. It was simple. Just had to focus on what he needed to do, what he had by way of assets and liabilities.

He had to get up to that crumbling shack over on Black Ridge as fast as he could, and he had about two things going for him. One was his military training and the other was however little he had by way of the element of surprise.

Everything else was a liability. He had no weapons, no cover of darkness, nothing but his own ingenuity to rely on. He had a bunch of help coming, but then again, they weren't trained for this sort of thing, not even as much as the freshest Marine recruit he'd commanded back in the war. More than that, they were people he'd known all his life, people he loved and while he never liked seeing anyone hurt, watching one of his family or friends fall prey to whatever violence this Ivy could unleash would be excruciating – but no. He wasn't thinking about that.

He was a Marine sergeant on a mission. He was about to have a squadron to command. (And what a squadron. Keeping Molly in line was a boggling notion all by itself. Throw in Alice and Rosco and the loose cannon that Cooter could be and he just about had a headache from trying to figure out how he was going to control them all.) They were young (some of them) and naïve (most of them) and vulnerable (all of them). But they were eager and committed, too.

And about all Luke could do to help them was to get there first, to scout the area and make a plan. Which meant a lot of fast thinking in a very short time. It was a dang good thing he had _Tilly_ 's wheels under him.

* * *

"You got any plans on feeding me?"

If Luke were here, he'd roll his eyes, he'd say something about Bo and food and how the two were lovers never meant to be parted. But it had been hours. Going on a day now, close enough to count anyway. It had been far too long since he'd eaten.

Besides, there seemed to be someone missing. First, his captors had been talking about needing Velma, but soon after Kevin and Jeremy had returned from wherever the van was parked, this Velma had shown up. She wasn't much of anything to look at. Maybe a couple years older than him with a nice enough body, but a sneer on her face that looked like it had been born there. Besides, she had a husband, which immediately made her less interesting. Especially when the man in question showed up sometime after she had, looking like a mole or a vole or just plain something that belonged underground. Squinty-eyed and pointy-nosed, and if Velma hadn't waited for someone better than him to come along, well, she must have been plain desperate. Desperate women weren't attractive. Then again, they were easy to wrap around your little finger, and Bo was good at doing that.

So now there were five of them: Ivy, Kevin, Jeremy, Velma, and Bob the mole-faced husband. And amongst them, they mustered enough smarts to make up about one brain, and that was mostly in Ivy's head.

Apparently they didn't have anything by way of soap, either. Hadn't anytime in their whole lives, if the overwhelming smell of sweat was any indication.

Now muscle, they had plenty of that. Any of the men alone would be a serious opponent. All three of them together would be impossible for him to beat in a fight, and they were just stupid enough to keep beating on him even if he was knocked out cold.

But they were also stupid enough that Bo could mess with them. Just keep throwing words out at them until a few stuck, and they started fighting amongst themselves. Time wasn't anything he could measure by this point, but if he had to guess, he'd say that it had only taken minutes for him to get them at each other's throats. Now he just had to keep them there.

"Because I'm really hungry."

Jeremy – or maybe it was Kevin; he had been never properly introduced to any of them – let the chair he'd been rocking back in flop forward onto all four legs again.

"No," Velma snapped at him. He knew who she was because there were only two women here and the other one was the creepily flirtatious Aunt Ivy, with whom Bo had spent plenty enough time, thank you very much. Trying like heck not to tell her anything important while she asked him awkward questions about Jesse and kept touching his hair. "We ain't going to feed you."

And that was all Jeremy (or Kevin, the one who had been teetering on his chair) needed to know. "Why not, Vel? You figure you're too good to cook for us anymore?"

The other Kevin-or-Jeremy snorted his agreement with that sentiment, as he spent time carving something into the already disastrous little table around which most of them were huddled.

"Yeah," Velma snapped right back at him. Her husband stood behind where she was sitting in one of the chairs, squeezing her shoulder and leveling a hard glare at the two Kevin-Jeremys. "I reckon it wouldn't do you two any harm to lose some weight. Or you could learn to cook for yourselves," which made one of the two squint hard at her. Bo could relate. Every now and then Daisy would get a wild hair about how he or Luke learn to cook, and it never made him too happy, either. "Which would amount to the same thing since can't neither of you take care of a single thing without me." That sounded like Daisy, too (and that was half of what Bo was counting on).

"Cooking ain't taking care of ourselves. Hunting up the meat, that's the important thing. All you got to do is—"

"Would you all quit that infernal noise?" That was Aunt Ivy, and Bo was counting on that, too. Every time she took to lecturing her kin, she turned her attentions away from him. Which left Bo with a minute or two to try to work through the knots on his ropes. "And just sit in peace for a while. This will all be over soon." Of course, it would be a lot easier to get through the ropes if Bo had his knife. But as dumb as this band of… whatever they were… was, they'd been smart enough to take his knife out of his pouch sometime when he was out cold.

"Not soon enough," the one guy said – the one that was carving up the table. With Bo's knife and that was just annoying. He was going to leave it dull enough that it wouldn't cut through melted butter.

"Soon," Aunt Ivy asserted. Harrumphs all around, and then there was silence.

"I'm still hungry, though," Bo pointed out. "Thirsty, too." He offered up his most innocent smile. He was an honest guy, after all, a Duke. (Too honest – he was plenty thirsty, and maybe he'd been trying to ignore that little fact until now.) "Don't suppose I could trouble you for some water?"

That set them to squabbling again. About how Bo wasn't the only thirsty one and how much trouble was it, really, to get some water? Well, did any of them see a sink in here?

No, Bo didn't. No sink, just like there hadn't been one in here that afternoon when he and Luke had stumbled upon this place as kids. But as long as the rest of them were busy pointing out the lack of running water to each other, he could keep trying to loosen the bottom of the knot. He was getting somewhere, maybe. At least he thought he was, but it was hard to tell when one of his hands was bruised and swollen from where it had been nearly crushed in the struggle of the night before, and both of them were pretty numb by now.

"There's the creek," the one who liked to rock his chair up onto two feet was saying. "Reckon someone could fetch some water back here from there."

"And by someone, you mean me, right?" Velma answered back, and the argument started up again about who did more work than everybody else.

New skin on the palms of his hands and pads of his fingers where they were still healing from the burns, making the rope harder to grip, harder to manipulate. But he was getting somewhere; he had more slack around his wrists. It wouldn't be long now.

"Now, if we was at the Boar's Nest," he mused, right up into the middle of their arguing. Smile on his face that wasn't even planned, because he could just picture himself in the Boar's nest right now, and the image made him happy. "I wouldn't have to go nowhere to get a drink. Why, I'd have girls fighting each other for the chance to bring me one." And then the feeling faltered and stumbled. Almost fell. He was supposed to be out with Luke tonight, drinking his first legal beer. Today was his birthday.

"Me too," one of the Kevin-Jeremys echoed.

"Hell, wouldn't no one bring _you_ nothing," Velma was saying back. "Unless it was a bag to put over your ugly face."

She kind of had a point there. Bo smirked in spite of himself. Downright grinned all over again, because all he really had to do was get himself free. Well, that and outrun some bullets. Should be a cinch.

"Shut up, before I smack you in the mouth," got snapped back at Velma.

"You just watch what you say to her." That was Bob.

He was close. So close to being untied. His hands were loose enough that he thought he could easily throw the ropes off when the right moment came. He still needed his feet free if he was going to run, though. The ropes wrapped around his shoulders would fall away easily enough.

"Or you'll what? You ain't going to do nothing to me. Aunt Ivy wouldn't let you. You ain't even technically a Culpepper."

And he was going to need to run. He'd buy himself a few seconds with their infighting and maybe a few more with surprise, but after that it would be all up to him to move faster than they could shoot him.

"He's married to me, ain't he? That makes him a Culpepper."

"No, Vel, that makes you a Donnelly. Ain't neither of you Culpeppers anymore."

But it was tricky, because Ivy was mostly ignoring the fighting this time. She wasn't staring at Bo with that strange fixation anymore, but she was still facing his general direction. Looking past him, and too much wiggling on his part would catch her eyes again.

"I'm more Culpepper than you are."

He shifted his weight, tried to make it look like he was just stiff, and not like he was trying to get his hands down near his feet. Seemed to work okay. Ivy was still staring off over his head, anyway.

"How do you figure?"

Meanwhile the rest of them were still arguing. He shifted again, felt for the knot that bound his legs, touched it with his fingertips. He had enough slack now to untie it quickly. As a matter of fact, it was already coming loose. Of course, he'd have to just about kiss his own knees to get it all the way free.

"She's only your aunt, but Ivy's my ma."

As if the sound of her name had startled her, Ivy turned toward the group of younger folks. "Hush now," she said.

"That don't even make no sense," Kevin-or-Jeremy blurted.

"Hush, I said!" Ivy said in an urgent hiss that stopped the fools from sniping at each other. Then she was staring back over Bo's head. The rest of the group turned their heads to see what she was looking at. Bo tried to do the same, but the back to the chair was too high. All he knew was that there was sunlight coming through a window over there somewhere.

"Well, I'll be." A slow smile crept onto Ivy's face. It wasn't a precisely pretty thing to see, not with the cruel curve at the corner of her lips. "It's the other one. Well, well. Bo, I reckon we'll keep you around a bit longer. And once we get your cousin in here, I reckon Jesse Duke's going to have to negotiate with old Poison Ivy after all. Go get him, boys!"


	25. Freeze! Or the Fat Man Gets It

**Twenty-five: Freeze! Or the Fat Man Gets It  
**

 _August 3, 1974_

That Duke boy had forgotten who was the law in these parts. Never mind that they had crossed out of Hazzard and into Chickasaw along one of those dirt roads on which Jesse Duke had led their caravan. Rosco still had a hat and a gun and most importantly, a badge that showed him as the ranking officer. But Luke Duke, he didn't pay any mind to badges and uniforms. He just barged impatiently over the CB airwaves, told them all where to leave their vehicles and where to meet him. And when they'd found him standing between this shrub and that one in the middle of a bunch of other shrubs and nothing else distinct about the place, that boy had started mouthing off like he was the one in charge.

And sure, they were in a place where Rosco had never been before, with an overabundance of trees, crawling and flying vermin, the overpowering stench of pine sap, a whole mess of dirt and not near enough pavement for his liking. Dozens of miles from town or anything resembling a town. Meanwhile, the Duke boy was in his element.

But he was still a lawbreaking moonshiner and he didn't have any right to take command.

Except he was the only one who knew where they were going, so Luke led the whole bunch of them – Jesse Duke (and his shotgun) following right on his heels, then Enos (who should have been waiting for orders from his superior officer), then Cooter Davenport, then Rosco (but it wasn't his fault that his boots were slippery and he couldn't keep up with the rest of them), then Daisy Duke right behind him, all but shoving and telling him to hurry up, and finally Molly and Alice Snodgrass – climbing along a trail that wasn't so much a path as undergrowth. Whipping branches and sticking thorns and far too many green things.

Something moved. Something he couldn't see, but the dried leaves whispered, then crunched just over to the left. Rosco whirled toward the scratching, hand clenched around the smooth butt of his revolver, but the dang thing wouldn't budge from its holster. Something touched his shoulder, heavy and hot and reeking or grease and car exhaust and at the same moment there was scurrying movement up around the trunk of a tree–

"Them's squirrels, Rosco," came the far too happy explanation from the owner of the hand on his shoulder.

"I know them's squirrels, Cooter," he snapped, "I—"

"Shh," Got hissed back at them from somewhere near the front of the line. But Rosco knew they were squirrels. Foolish squirrels that didn't value their own lives when they taunted a duly constituted lawman that way. The pair of them chased each other up the tree and out of sight.

"Gij," Rosco might have mumbled as he let go of his weapon. Those squirrels were just lucky he couldn't arrest them for creating a nuisance. And that he was so out of breath that he couldn't read them their rights.

He could see a clearing up the hill a ways, and if they could get there… But no. Not until Luke Duke stopped them all and explained what lay ahead: an old, beaten down cabin with only one door in or out, windows on three sides, and a broken roof at one end. Woods all around it, but to get close, they'd have to be out in the clear, where anyone looking out the windows could see them.

Rosco pointed out that he and Enos were armed lawmen, and that all they had to do was go up there, kick in the door, announce that Poison Ivy was under arrest and the whole problem would be solved. Luke rolled his eyes so hard it should have given him a headache, and pointed out that it wasn't just some old lady in there with Bo, it was two young guys – _and they ain't lightweights_ , Cooter had added – and potentially others that they didn't know about. More than that, there was Bo in there, maybe hurt and maybe at gunpoint. Rosco and Enos might just turn this thing into a shootout that would get Bo hurt.

Rosco noticed that Luke didn't seem to be terribly concerned about whether the two lawmen got hurt.

But since there was only one way in or out of the shack – at least for a normal person, Luke said, and Rosco inexplicably bristled at being called "normal" – Luke figured the group could split into two parts. Everyone would head for the windowless backside of the cabin. Then Enos, Cooter, Molly and Alice would go around the south side and Rosco, Jesse, and Daisy would go around the north side. They should all stay as much in the in the tree line as possible to keep from being seen, and be ready for anything.

Luke, meanwhile, was going to come around the north side, but while the rest of them hid in the too-much greenery that was everywhere, the Duke boy would quickly break cover and make for the pine tree closest to the shack. He would climb it, shimmy out on a limb, and with any luck, find himself on the roof near where there was a hole large enough for him to drop into the shack itself.

Jesse Duke turned into a thundercloud over that one. Dark, mean and sparking with dangerous electricity, but Luke countered that as long as he didn't get shot right away – more deep rumblings and flashes of lightning from Jesse – he would get himself to Bo and do whatever was necessary to get the youngster out safely. It was, Luke said, the only way he could think of to try to assure that Bo would make it out of there in one piece.

Jesse didn't so much relent as recognize that Luke was adamant, and that he was going to do what he planned with or without anyone's approval. The best the rest of them could do was to somehow try to cover him from the outside. So Jesse shouldered his flintlock like a good soldier, and they all went to their assigned posts, even if Rosco still didn't understand why the Duke boy got to give all the orders around here.

And old Luke wasn't so smart, anyway. Heck, he'd assumed he could get from the edge of the clearing to the tree just fine, but he didn't make it more than two-thirds that far before a pair of boys – the ones that had been working for Cooter's daddy, looked like – came slamming out of the rickety door of the sad little cabin, waving revolvers and screaming things about hold it right there and don't come no closer.

Luke's hands went up in surrender, and Rosco couldn't help but notice that the boy had never once gotten his hands up half that fast when it was a lawman brandishing a firearm.

Speaking of devils and lawmen, there went Enos, jumping into the clearing with his service weapon drawn and hollering, "Halt, in the name of the law!"

The youngster had seen too many movies.

The men turned their attention away from Luke, and one of them pointed his weapon back at Enos.

"Enos! Look out!" That was Daisy Duke, breaking cover and running toward the deputy, as though a twig of a girl like her could provide any protection at all.

Rosco's legs moved before his brain could think, then he was out in the open, too. Revolver out of its holster, he called out, "Freeze!" A very simple command that even a dipstick could understand.

Not that anyone exactly obeyed him.

Luke Duke started it. He kicked high to knock the gun out from the hand of the guy nearest him. A curse got hollered out from somewhere, then the door to the cabin swung open with pained screech against the abuse. A third man burst out, blinking into the sunlight, gun raised and waving around. Rosco made a beeline for him, saw Enos doing the same. Caught movement out of the corner of his eye, heard a gun blast and smelled powder. Flattened himself the ground, because that was what a smart man did when there was shooting going on around him.

Looked up from his face-full of dirt to see that no one else was smart. The dummies were still on their feet: Luke was fighting with the same youngster he'd kicked the revolver away from, Cooter had charged the other fellow and disarmed him somehow or other (which was probably what caused the weapons discharge, but it didn't seem like anyone got shot), and Enos had the third man pinned down by the door. Other than a few thrown fists still to be contended with, it seemed like the crisis was over. The problem was solved and Rosco could chalk it up to another case cracked by the Hazzard Sheriff's Department.

"All right," came a quiet voice from Rosco's right. "Everybody just settle down now."

Rosco turned toward the sound and saw white. A whole mess of white that was almost as wide as it was tall. Three-piece suit white. The sort of white that only one man in the tri-county area ever wore. But J.D. Hogg wasn't alone. And he didn't look any too happy to be where he was. Which was standing at the edge of the clearing, maybe twenty feet to the south of the rest of them, with a gun to his head.

And a man behind him, wielding that gun.

"Everybody knock it off, or the fat man gets it."

* * *

The instant the gun came up to bear at the center of Enos' chest, Daisy's heart stopped. Laid still and played dead even as he became a blue blur running at the weapon, and a shot rang out. Refused to budge or beat, even after the bad guy was subdued, and didn't start up again until J.D. Hogg started squealing about how everyone ought to listen to the man with the gun aimed at his head. Enos dragged himself to his feet then, hauling up the bad guy after him, and there were no red stains darkening any part of his uniform.

Everyone's hands went up – well, everyone's in the Duke party, anyway (even Luke's and he'd never had a single good thing to say about J.D. Hogg that she could remember) – and then her heart had to get going again. The bad guys, the ones who had come charging out of the cabin with intent to shoot her friends and family, reclaimed their guns and commandeered Rosco and Enos' for good measure, not to mention Jesse's shotgun. Then they ordered everyone except themselves to bunch together in the middle of the clearing, so they could be surrounded by the gunmen. She had to move, so her heart had to beat.

They all did as they were told, though it took a couple of prods and shoves to get Cooter and Luke into the group, and J.D. Hogg protested about having to be lumped in with the rest of them – until Jesse told him to knock it off, that was. Tight quarters; she and Alice and Molly were in the middle, protected by a ring of men around them. (Well, J.D. Hogg was in the middle, too. Cowering like the belly crawler that he was.) As if they needed protection, as if bullets somehow wouldn't reach them if they were behind the menfolk. Some part of her wanted to push to the outer ring with the guys, but she got distracted, for all of a few seconds, by warmth and softness against her hand. Enos, holding onto her. Not for long, just a squeeze to calm her down, to remind her that any fool move she might make could put the people she cared about (including Enos) in jeopardy.

Her hand got dropped like a hot potato when a high-pitched scream came from the shack. An echoing squeal that sounded an awful lot like terror came from J.D. Hogg, and then there was movement all around her – pushing, shoving, an elbow hit her in the temple hard enough to make her bite her tongue. Taste of blood in her mouth, dizzy and dust rising – it took her a second to figure out that the scream from the cabin had somehow led to the Duke men, along with Enos and Cooter and even Rosco, getting the upper hand again. Guns had been kicked aside or tossed away, and there was a knockdown, drag out brawl going on in the clearing. A meaty hand grabbed hers and tugged, and then she was outside of the melee.

Alice stood close and hot at her side, panting, bug-eyed, keeping a safe distance from the fray. J.D. Hogg was slinking away from the battle, too, blustering something nearly nonsensical at anyone who would listen (which was no one at all), about not knowing that things would turn out this badly.

Jesse was there at the edge of her vision, hovering in the tree line. Somewhere, somehow, he'd retrieved his shotgun, which he cocked with a click, and pointed skyward like he was considering firing it off. Might have been a good idea, might not have. Hard to say whether a startling blast from Jesse's shotgun might turn into a disadvantage for Luke, Cooter, Enos or Rosco, all of whom seemed to be engaged in one kind of hand-to-hand combat or another. Rosco's method mostly consisted of telling his opponent – the graying, lean man who had just been holding Hogg hostage – to freeze, freeze, freeze, and then sidestepping anything that resembled a punch. The sheriff was surprisingly nimble when he didn't want to get hit.

But Enos, he was up against one of the bulkier guys. A man Daisy had never seen before today, with sandy hair and a mustache that was thick and heavy enough to be a burden all by itself. He was strong, though. A good fighter and Enos had taken a few solid hits.

Almost before she realized that she was tensing to come to Enos' defense, Daisy felt a tug on her arm.

"You just stay back," Jesse told her. "And let them sort it out."

"But—" she had plenty she wanted to say on that subject, about how she couldn't leave them out there, not when Cooter was pulling at one of the guys that was double-teaming Luke, and Enos was bleeding from his lip. Before she managed to get any more words out, the door to the shack swung wide and Velma charged out, holding something square, big and dark. Carrying it up high like she might just use it to clobber Rosco over the head.

Daisy broke loose from Jesse, boot soles slipping on the loose dirt of the clearing, heart going double-time against her ribcage. Hard to breathe, but maybe that was because she was yelling. Velma turned to look in her direction, but it was too late. Daisy's hands were out, her balance tipping forward, and there was pain in her knees, a startling, breathless collision with the hardpan of the clearing. Velma came down with her, tackled at the knees, and the thing she'd been carrying – a suitcase of some kind, not a weapon after all – slammed to the ground even harder than she did. Daisy was holding desperately to Velma's thrashing legs, taste of dirt and blood on her lips, when she saw the paper falling around her like snow.

Money, and an awful lot of it.

That brought a sudden end to the brawl. She let go of Velma, and the men that had been fighting Rosco and Enos lost interest in beating on anyone in deference to trying to capture as many of the flying bills as possible – J.D. Hogg was in that mix, too – and the distraction was enough for Luke and Cooter to subdue the guys they'd been fighting. Velma was sitting in the dirt next to Daisy, yelling or crying or maybe both at once.

And then the door to the cabin opened one more time, and there was Bo, walking into the clearing with a firm hand around the upper arm of the Hazzard's erstwhile librarian, I. Young, and a tired twist of a smile on his face.

"It's about time y'all showed up."


	26. Relative Normal (Amongst Abnormal Relati

_**Author's note:** I usually try not to let stories languish because there's nothing more frustrating than a story that never gets finished. It's just been a particularly hard couple of months. But I promise, I will always finish any story that I start, even if sometimes it takes me a while to post._

 _We're just about at the end of this one (one more chapter to go), so I'll take this opportunity to thank the readers and reviewers for investing their time in this tale. Y'all have been great, as always._

* * *

 **Twenty-six: Relative Normal (Amongst Abnormal Relatives)**

 _August 3, 1974_

It had to have been the most ridiculous rescue ever. Nothing like the movies, where the good guys showed up with their white hats and the might of right on their sides, and just plain decimated the black hats. What happened at the shack up on Black Ridge was a mess, just three inches short of disaster.

Not that Bo wasn't happy to be rescued. At least mostly, though he pretty well figured he could have handled things himself. He was just about untied and had the feeling back in most of his extremities by the time Aunt Ivy spotted Luke and sent her nephews out to capture themselves a second Duke.

Later, when the entire rescue party was perched in odd places around the Duke family farmyard, devouring Daisy's special fried chicken and taking turns telling Bo that he looked puny, Luke had been forced to admit that everything hadn't turned out exactly like it was supposed to. There had been some damn fool scheme that had Luke coming in through the hole in the roof over that side room. Which was dumb, because if the roof was already damaged, what made Luke think it would hold his weight? But there was no telling his cousin that – he would have said that he could have handled whatever happened.

That much was true. Luke was a Duke, and well practiced at improvising. Which was what they'd all had to do when the plan had crumbled to the ground faster than a pup tent in a windstorm.

Maybe it helped that what went on outside the cabin was sorely out of control. When Velma's husband, Bob – who might just have been the coward of the bunch – got sent outside to help Jeremy and Kevin, both the women spent more time hovering at the edges of the windows than they did watching Bo.

That had made it easy for him to throw the ropes off his hands and shoulders, to stand (to notice that the outside had gone from a whole lot of noise to a troubling near-silence) and to waddle over to where his knife had been unceremoniously dropped on the pitiful table. Intent only on cutting his feet free of the last bit of rope, but his movement caught Velma's eye. She turned to see him armed (with what was probably the dullest knife in three counties, by that point) and let out one hell of a scream. Bloodcurdling and loud, made Ivy duck low like she was avoiding a swarm of bats, and changed the dynamic outside the cabin, too.

Turned out he didn't need to saw through the ropes, anyway – they'd dropped off of their own accord as he'd shuffled along. By that time, Velma had scurried over to a brown, boxy case that was bigger than a briefcase but smaller than a suitcase, and had been stashed in a corner of the shack where Bo hadn't seen it until now. Velma caught it by the handle and started for the door. Ivy came partway out of her crouch and scuttled toward Velma. Tried to grab for the case, but Velma yanked it up in the air and held it over her head. Same trick Bo could pull on Luke, now that he was the taller one. Ivy was shameless, though – Luke would have stood there with his arms across his chest and glowered his distaste, but Ivy hopped up and down, grabbing at the air, as much as her older-lady legs would let her. Didn't work, made Velma smirk, so Ivy just grabbed onto one of her daughter's arms and pulled on it.

Velma – charming young lady that she was, planted a knee in her mother's solar plexus. Ivy's face collapsed with the desperate urge to breathe as she doubled over. Meanwhile, Velma turned, ran, then used that same knee to kick the door open, and sprinted through.

Ivy might have been his kidnapper, might have given the orders all down the line for every bad thing that had befallen the Dukes this summer, might have had it in for Jesse one way or another, and might even have been perfectly willing to kill Bo, but she was still a woman, and an older one at that. So he sheathed his knife, strode over to Ivy, grabbed hold of her bony arm and helped her find her feet. Patted her back until her mouth stopped gulping like a goldfish's and she sucked in a deep breath of air. After that, it didn't take a whole lot of effort to keep hold of her and escort her out of the shack.

And right into the middle of Luke's lame-brained rescue, which had degenerated into a melee. Rosco was babbling at a man that Bo had never seen before and Daisy was in the dust with Velma, money floating around her head as if her world had been tipped like one of those snow-globes. J.D. Hogg was a stuck pig, squealing about the dollar bills flying in the breeze, and Luke was at the bottom of a pushing, shoving, punching dogpile that included Kevin, Jeremy and Cooter. Jesse was there with his shotgun in hand, right on the verge of yelling at someone or everyone all at once. Probably getting ready to threaten whippings for the whole bunch.

But the Dukes and their friends had won this thing, and it wasn't too long before the ridiculous rescue turned into an even more ridiculous arrest scene. More suspects than handcuffs, Rosco spitting and sputtering, Enos squeaking and J.D. Hogg blustering while the bad guys blamed each other for their current predicament, and somewhere in there, Luke had made his way across the dusty clearing. He'd grabbed Bo by the shoulders and stared at him, too hard and too long until the blue of his eyes shimmered wetly. It was almost more than Bo could stand to look back into, and then he'd been pulled into a hug. Bone and muscle, rough, because despite all of Jesse's efforts, Luke never had quite figured out how to be gentle. But it was warm and welcome all the same. Even if, when it was done, blood from Luke's split lip had left an ugly blood stain on Bo's already filthy shirt.

One cousin moved away, and the other filled the space, offering up a squeeze that was only half of what she was capable of. Maybe Daisy was taking it easy on him. Didn't matter, because Jesse was there to encircle him in a bear hug that would have broken a weaker man's bones.

And then the oldster set to lecturing Aunt Ivy – who was also Poison Ivy from Jesse's old-time moonshining stories, as well as being I. Young, the librarian (and that was a lot of things to be all at once) – about just how disappointed he was in her. Here she'd had a second chance at living a good, respectable life and she'd thrown it all away, and for what? Ivy didn't have any answers, didn't even look at Jesse. Just spent all her time glowering at Molly, whose hands were on her hips, elbows jutted proudly out to the side.

The rope that had bound Bo's wrists and ankles for the better part of a day got re-purposed to turn the whole mess of crooks into a makeshift chain gang with the two sets of handcuffs shared amongst the four men. The cash that hadn't blown off to parts unknown was collected out of the soft dirt – J.D. Hogg squirmed to get involved in that, but Jesse held him back – and Ivy's family and friends were herded slowly down a steep path to the bottom of the hill, with Rosco pointing his service revolver at them all the way. The bed of the Duke patriarch's pickup was deemed the best means to get the crooks back to town, so Jesse drove and Rosco and Enos rode in the back with the prisoners.

That left the rest of them to get the fleet of cars that had been driven up here out of the slender pull-off they'd been parked in, but Bo was forbidden from driving any of them. Which had left him riding back down into Hazzard in _Tilly_ , with Luke behind the wheel.

The two of them had somewhere verging on a million questions to ask each other, but then again, Bo fell asleep before the first one could even get out of his mouth. By the time he woke up again, _Tilly_ was parked in the farmyard, and Luke was shaking his shoulder with all the regret in the world.

"Come on, cousin, get up. You're too heavy to carry."

His pride was glad to hear that, because Daisy and Alice and Molly and Cooter were piling out of cars all around them (including Enos' daddy's sedan and Rosco's mama's heavy old beast, which meant the law would have to come back here before the day was through) and there would have been no living it down if any of them had seen Luke hauling him out of the car like an oversized child. Bo gave his head a quick shake and shoved against the dead weight of _Tilly_ 's door to join everyone else in the farmyard.

Molly was a black spot in an otherwise beautiful afternoon, sulking loudly over how Jesse could ever suspect her of wrongdoing. Daisy fixed that like only a woman would: she said she felt like cooking. Not just cooking, but _cooking_. Molly asked what they had at the house and it turned into a discussion of _what a shame, no crawdads for bisque, but we've got chicken_. That was enough to get the whole gang inside the house, in the kitchen and conspiring together, Cooter licking his chops at the prospect of food that didn't come out of a can. Alice settled in with Daisy and Molly, but only because she couldn't follow Bo and Luke into their bedroom. Jesse had rules about that, even if he wasn't here to enforce them.

Behind closed doors, Luke checked him over carefully, assessing injuries, tsking over rope burns and bruises, especially the one on his hand. Wasn't too thrilled over the bump and cut on Bo's head from where he'd been knocked cold with a branch or a rock. Bo wasn't exactly happy about Luke's bloodied nose and split lip, either, but his worries got lost in another hug, then Luke sent him off for a shower.

"Happy birthday," followed him down the hall, and even if he was tired and sore and maybe just a little sick of Luke's overprotective ways, he smiled.

And figured he might as well use up all the hot water in the house because no one would deny him the opportunity to spend as long as he wanted washing away the filth of the last twenty-four hours. Not today.

His feet were dragging when he made it back to the kitchen, cleaner and achingly aware of all the ways his body had been abused. He had every intention of insisting that he wanted to go out with Luke and Daisy tonight to celebrate his birthday at the Boar's Nest all the same, but got distracted by the smell of fried chicken. Daisy said that most of the food was ready enough to eat, so he helped carry it outside, where far too many people were crowded around the picnic table. Jesse had returned from town with Rosco and Enos in tow. Someone was clever enough to have gotten paper plates and plastic cups from somewhere; must have known that the Dukes didn't have enough dishes to serve this many people. (Heck, they'd been stretching it to have Alice and Molly at their table the last few weeks. Someone had to use the chipped plate at every meal.) There was chicken and potato salad and some kind of noodle thing, corn on the cob and somehow a watermelon had showed up – "Just to tide you over until the cobbler is ready," Daisy said – and lemonade that would be too sour once they got to dessert.

They settled around the farmyard as best they could – Jesse, Molly and Rosco Coltrane at the picnic table, because they were older or just plain fussier, Daisy sitting low on the porch steps with Cooter close by. Enos was a notable distance away, leaning against a post and balancing his meal in one hand while eating with the other. Bo and Luke pulled down the tailgate of Jesse pickup, and Alice joined them in sitting there. On the far side of Luke, because Bo wasn't anyone's fool. He'd sat at one of the ends.

"What I want to know," Luke was saying, but his mouth was half full, and he got one chubby, rheumatic finger pointed across the farmyard at him for the infraction. Swallowed, and picked up right where he'd left off. "Is what J.D. Hogg had to do with all of this."

"He says he didn't know what was going to happen," Rosco jumped in.

"I know what he says, but what did he do?"

"That guy, the one who had him at gunpoint, that was Clem Clemmons. Maybe you heard of him." That was Enos, who'd been mostly quiet. Now he was talking fast and gesturing with his plastic fork, which was sending bits of potato in a small radius around him. Apparently Clem Clemmons was important, somehow. To Enos, anyway. "He's—"

"Hush, Enos," Rosco scolded. "That's an ongoing investigation. These here civilians don't need to hear about it."

"I reckon they're more than just civilians," Enos countered bravely, but in that unfailingly polite and almost apologetic way only he could pull off. "They're victims. At least the Dukes are. And the rest of them are witnesses. Besides, wouldn't none of you go repeating nothing I say in public, would you?"

They offered up their assurances, and Rosco gestured his permission, or maybe just his disavowal of all knowledge of whatever followed.

"Clem Clemmons is a big-time counterfeiter from over in Hatchapee," Enos explained. Rosco mumbled something that disputed exactly how _big time_ Clemmons really was. "And he was also in love with Ivy Young. Now, when she got out of prison a bunch of months back, she figured she would get revenge on you Dukes – and Molly there, too – for how you got her arrested back when you all was competitors. She wanted to put y'all out of business,"

"What does this have to do with J.D. Hogg?" Luke demanded. Old grumpy hadn't gotten any sleep at all last night. Which was his own scheming fault.

"Well, Ivy wanted y'all out of business and J.D. Hogg did, too. He swears up and down that all he had in mind was to scare y'all a bit. He didn't want nothing bad to happen to you, Bo."

"So basically, this Clemmons guy helped Ivy, what? Burn down our barn? Try to run us off the road at night?" While they were on a moonshine delivery, but Luke would never say that part out loud. "And that money in that suitcase thing, it wasn't real?"

"Oh, it was real," Rosco answered with a hard edged chuckle. "And now it's evidence."

"But we ain't sure what it was used for," Enos said. "All them people from Ivy's gang, they're on their way to Atlanta. The state police got a few questions for them."

"What about J.D. Hogg?" Bo asked, snatching a wing off Luke's plate. Got a mean little look in return. That'd teach Luke about priorities when it came to food and interrogating the law. Poor wing had been sadly neglected and now it was justifiably Bo's. That, or Luke wasn't going to fight him for it when he knew Bo had gone without food for far too long. "Don't they got a few questions for him?"

"No they ain't," Rosco said with a strange little giggle. One that didn't sound stupid or happy or like his usual nonsense. It was almost smug, with a dash of bitterness. "Not since he let them take all that money as evidence instead of trying to keep it for himself."

"Clem Clemmons, he was more into forging bonds and stocks and stuff," Enos said. "Not actual cash money. But he was wanted and I knew who he was right away when he showed up at Miss Ivy's cabin." Proud little smile that elicited something close to a harrumph from Rosco. "Because he was on a bunch of wanted posters back at the office. And I studied those real good, just like the sheriff told me."

"That's right!" A smirk bloomed up on Rosco's face. Like he really planned to take credit, but that was fine. Enos' echoing grin showed that he was perfectly willing to give it to him. "I did! I really trained that boy right."

Cooter reached around Daisy – who was doing a real good job of picking her chicken apart, studying every piece and not really eating anything at all – to give Enos a congratulatory slap on the ankle. Since that was as far as his arm would reach and all.

"So Ivy wanted us out of business," Luke recounted. "And she had a whole mess of mostly family helping her. They infiltrated all these businesses in Hazzard to watch us so they knew when they could get to us. And at the same time, J.D. wanted our land so, what? He paid Ivy to do what she already wanted to do anyway?"

"Now, Luke, we don't know that for sure," Jesse interrupted, pointing his plastic fork in their direction.

"Of course you don't," Rosco jumped in. "Especially since he let the money go as evidence."

"And then," Luke said, ignoring both objections as if they were silly. (And they were, except for how it wasn't smart to dismiss Jesse or Rosco like that.) "When we tried to catch them in the act, the kidnapped Bo. But why?"

Blank looks all around, until Bo filled it in for them.

"Even they didn't know that. Seems like them two boys thought it was a good idea at the time, but Ivy, she didn't want nothing to do with me. Back when we was up on that hill, she yelled 'Get 'im,' but she didn't mean she wanted me caught. Just beat up or something. Once they got me down that hill, I guess she figured they couldn't just leave me there, so they took me up to her shack." She'd wanted something to do with Uncle Jesse though, and it wasn't just to put him out of business. Clem Clemmons may have been in love with Ivy, but Ivy was carrying some kind of a warped torch for Jesse. "And once they had me, they figured they'd have to kill me. Which was why I had to get out of them ropes."

Luke put his plate down on the tailgate, then shuffled a bit until he was close enough that his shoulder rubbed against Bo's. It was just about as close to admitting that he was upset by the news as Luke would get.

"Anyway," Jesse said, dropping his fork and having a quick little fight with the picnic table until he could get to his feet. Wiping his hands on his overalls and waddling over to the tail of the truck. "We're all together again. In one piece and no real harm come to any of us." One of his meaty hands came up to rest on Bo's shoulder. A deep look into his eyes, and quick pat. "And I reckon the main thing is that we're all thankful for that."

Amen.

"I'm thankful that them boys didn't hurt you none," Cooter piped up while Jesse made his way back toward the table. "I don't reckon my daddy would have hired them if he'd had the first idea what kind of trouble they were."

"I'm just thankful you wasn't hurt, Bo," Alice added and tried to shuffle closer to both him and Luke, but mostly she just succeeded in making the truck rock back and forth a lot.

Luke smirked and mumbled, "I'm just thankful that Molly and Alice can go home now." Low enough that no one else could make out the words. Might have been fine, except for how Bo laughed.

Daisy's eyebrow went up in confusion, Cooter laughed too, even if he didn't know why. Enos looked down at Daisy, Rosco made some fool noise, Luke snorted and Jesse looked murderous.

In all, everything was pretty much normal.

* * *

 _September 18, 1974_

But normal was relative. The barn still had to be rebuilt, the whiskey business jumpstarted and set back on track. Meanwhile there were police statements to be made for Rosco and later for the state police, who had a few questions of their own. Jesse and J.D. Hogg had to make some kind of peace between them. And then there was Molly and Alice to consider.

But first, before any of that, there was Bo's belated birthday to celebrate. It waited a day because Bo could smile, he could picnic with family and friends and talk about what had happened like it was nothing at all, but he was tired. Exhausted and hurt, even if he didn't want to say much about that part. His hand was bruised and swollen, he had cuts and welts on his arms, legs and torso from fighting and falling, he had an ugly bump on his head and rope burns on his wrists and ankles. All the protests in the world didn't add up to a hill of beans when Luke prodded him to bed before sunset, and he fell asleep mid-complaint.

And it wasn't any surprise that he didn't make it out for chores the next morning, either, especially since Luke decided against waking him. Then he missed church, but all of the Dukes did. Alice and Molly went, though, at Jesse's insistence.

But Bo wasn't about to take wait-until-you're-fully-healed (with-no-ugly-reminders-of-how-I-failed-to-keep-you-safe) for an answer, so come the night after his birthday, Luke agreed to take him out for a legal beer or two. Daisy tried to stay behind, on the excuse of leaving them to their celebrating, but Bo pouted until she relented.

Daisy sat mostly quietly to one side and watched the people come and go through the main door. Luke sat less quietly on the other side and watched Bo for any signs of fatigue. Bo smiled and drank and got fawned over by one girl after another until finally one of them dragged him out into the middle of the floor to dance. He stayed out there long enough to spend a little time with every girl that wanted him to. He was, despite all that had happened and what he'd been through, fine.

The next day, Molly said it was time she and Alice got back to the swamp. They'd been gone for nearly a month, so they weren't sure what kind of condition they'd find the old house in. Maybe one of Molly's nephews would have kept an eye on it and maybe not – which was why she prevailed upon Jesse to go back with them. Plus, there was Jesse's abiding guilt over briefly suspecting Molly of dishonesty. Yeah, Molly would milk that cow for another twenty years, at least.

Daisy went along to the swamp, too. Luke mumbled to Bo that she was going because she'd miss her roommates when they were gone, and the look that came back at him accused him of being crazy or sick or both. Bo said it had nothing to do with Alice and Molly and everything to do with needing to get away for a while. Luke just shrugged, because it didn't matter why Daisy was going with the rest of them. The only important thing was that Jesse said they'd be staying out in the swamp for a few days to get Molly settled. And that he'd call them every day, just so they'd know he hadn't been swallowed whole by an alligator or taken permanent prisoner by Molly.

Which left Luke and Bo to a few days of laziness. Until the third morning after Jesse left, when Bo got tired of being shooed away from the chores and being watched for signs that he was hurt worse than he was letting on, and tackled Luke to the hard ground of the farmyard. The wrestling match that followed left their clothes exactly the kind of disaster that would give Daisy weeks of nagging rights. Luke let Bo win the wrestling match out of the goodness of his heart. That was his story and he was sticking to it.

When Jesse and Daisy got back, the real work began. Bo and Luke knocked together a frame, and the word went out in church about a barn raising at the Duke farm. By Monday night the new barn stood next to the old farmhouse, and by Wednesday afternoon, the whole farm smelled of sawdust and fresh paint. Most of what had been stored in the old barn was long turned to ash, but folks brought by what they could. Heavily worn tools, threadbare horse blankets, buckets with welded patches, because that was what they could spare and it was fine. None of it was any worse off than what the Dukes had before the fire, anyway.

No one could replace what was really lost, the deeds and artifacts of Aunt Lavinia's heritage, mainly because no one other than the Dukes knew they were missing. And that was the way the family wanted to keep it. After all, guilty feelings and J.D. Hogg weren't exactly long-term friends and eventually he'd be trying to buy or steal Duke land again. No telling why he'd been poking around for information about the parcels on Bald Hill, whether it was part of his partnership with Ivy or just coincidence. But since the land had never been on the tax rolls, it was for the best that no one could prove the Dukes' ownership one way or the other. A new still site was selected in a hidden cove around the Chattahoochee Creek, and the works was moved under the cover of darkness, one heavy piece at a time. Lavinia's land was left to grow over as wild as it wanted to.

In the meantime, old J.D. had become twice as dangerous. The frantic electioneering for County Commissioner had started within days of Bo's rescue, and funny if old J.D. didn't tell the story in a very interesting way that left him looking awfully heroic. Efforts to correct his story only led to him talking louder, faster, spinning ever bigger yarns. Jesse said it didn't matter, that the county wouldn't believe such wild tales anyway. That everyone in Hazzard knew better.

Jesse was wrong. When the votes had been counted, J.D. Hogg had been elected the new Commissioner of Hazzard by a landslide. In other news, while there would now be money to pay both Rosco and Enos a reasonably fair wage, the sheriff's pension had been deemed more expense than the financially strapped county was willing to bear. And both of these changes would take effect on October first.

That left Rosco with the decision about whether to retire right now and take whatever was in his pension fund as consolation, or hang on and hope that the money would be reinstated one day. He announced his choice to stay put, claiming it was because he couldn't unleash a half-trained Enos on the county. Jesse said Rosco was staying because being a lawman was the only thing in his life that he had ever truly loved, Bessie Mae Wilkins aside. Luke figured Rosco kept the job because he'd taken a shine to the man who would be his new boss. It was almost cute how he followed the Commissioner-elect around like a hungry puppy after a meatless, pitiful bone.

The sheriff thought he had himself a little feather in his cap when it came time to officially arraign those dastardly Duke boys for spending a particular sweltering, July night wandering around the Courthouse. Judge Druten showed some leniency when he learned that Bo was technically a minor at the time of the incident, and that entry to the building had been gained through an unlocked window of the sheriff's office. There was a small fine and a couple of days of community service spent rebuilding the staircase at the orphanage (and playing with the kids when the work got tedious). And, one moonless night, there was a delivery of some of Jesse's finest 'shine to the home address of the circuit judge. It wasn't a bribe, or even thanks. It was just the same delivery that had been made regularly for eighteen years.

Meanwhile, the state police went through Poison Ivy's half-decrepit moonshining shack on Black Ridge in search of more evidence. When they didn't find much of anything, they moved on to Ivy's home, down in the Chickasaw Valley. It was there, in the narrow confines of a cobwebby ranch house that had been in the Culpepper family for generations, that they came upon a few interesting items. Maps with parcels marked out, some roads highlighted and marks made where no official roads had ever been built. A crumbling, sepia photo of the Duke family of old, with dark-haired Jesse surrounded by his brothers. Newer pictures, in color but out of focus, of the present day Dukes, working their farm. Nothing any of them could remember having seen before or known were being taken.

In the shed off the back of the house, amongst scattered junk and the skeletal remains of at least one deceased automobile, there was a late-model motorcycle. Funny thing if it didn't have a few corn husks caught in its spokes. There was also plenty of kerosene and more than a few boxes of matches, but no proof that any of it was used on the Duke barn.

Then there was that last thing, found on a shelf thick with old relics of a time gone by: a small, lopsided and mostly-ugly box, overflowing with index cards of fading recipes from past generations of Dukes. Maybe the Cupepppers had stolen it with the faulty belief that one of the recipes would tell them how to make Duke moonshine.

Crying was one of those things Luke had never really understood. Last time he'd done it himself was soon after his folks died. Bo did it every now and then, when he got really frustrated and angry. Daisy did it a lot, but she was a girl and that made it okay. But seeing Jesse cry (and pretend he wasn't) after that recipe box got returned – well, that didn't make sense. Luke reckoned the best thing he could do was the same as Jesse: act like nothing of the sort had ever happened.

There was no way to understand the Culpepper family. They were dumb, they were vengeful, they were criminals who used what little resources they could pull together to steal from others, rather than scratching out any kind of living of their own. But their biggest problem, Luke figured, was that they weren't committed to anything at all, not even each other. A family that couldn't rely on its own was doomed from the start, and prison might just be the best place to keep them locked away from the rest of the world.

After all the finishing touches on the barn had been completed, the hound dogs retrieved and the livestock resettled (and then resettled again after Maudine broke through her stall door the first morning in her new digs), there was harvest of what little corn had survived the neglectful season. Bo had worked as hard as ever (which wasn't all that hard at all) and that went to prove that whatever injuries he'd sustained from the fire and the kidnapping were fully healed.

That was why, when the worst of the summer steam had finally left the air, Luke had proposed a long hunting trip. Bo was ready to handle it, and Luke figured it would do them both a bit of good to get away for a few days. To go off into the wilderness on their own and prove to themselves that the long summer hadn't done them any permanent harm. Ivy's trial, and that of the rest of her gang members, would likely take place in the fall and there'd be plenty of time for reliving bad memories then. For now, he and Bo needed to get away from it all, to go off into the woods where they could forget their manners and their careful upbringing and just be boys.

Which meant that, overall, things were relatively normal. Everything and everyone was fine. Everyone, that was, except for Daisy.


	27. Union and Dissolution

_**Author's note:** Final chapter, here. I never really meant to hold it back for so long, but work just kept right on happening, despite my protests that I didn't want to do it... alas. Anyway, this chapter ties up those last few loose ends._

 _Thanks for coming along on another ride with me. Until next time!_

* * *

 **Twenty-seven: Union and Dissolution**

 _November 30, 1974_

They hadn't even broken up, not officially. Maybe that fit when they hadn't ever officially started dating. It had all just sort of fallen together, until it fell apart.

Anyway, no one had to say it out loud for Daisy and Enos to know it was true. The relationship was dead. Maybe they'd known since that night at the movies when they'd argued over Butch and Sundance. Maybe Enos arresting Bo and Luke on the wrong night, for the right reasons – they were guilty, after all – was just the final nail in a coffin that had already been built.

So she set about burying it.

The dizzying aftermath of that crazy summer provided plenty of distraction from her mourning, at least in the beginning.

That first week got taken up with settling Molly and Alice back into the swamp. The drive alone seemed to last a few days and was spooky enough to keep her focused on exactly where she was – riding with Alice in the ancient and creaky pink-hued pickup, getting her ear talked off about Bo and how great it was that he was okay and all, and did he like cookies? Alice wasn't half the cook that Molly was, but she could bake, and she knew Bo liked to eat – while Jesse rode shotgun in his own truck ahead of them. Twists and turns with quicksand and bogs and gators on either side of a narrow ribbon of a road, and Jesse hadn't much cared for giving the wheel over to Molly. Cared less for how both vehicles stopped somewhere in the middle of nowhere, and everybody got out. Daisy was slapping mosquitoes away from her bare arms and shoulders when the blindfolds came out.

"Now, Jess," Molly was saying in answer to grumbles and rolled eyes. "You done us a real big favor by putting us up and looking out for us for three weeks. But in them three weeks you ain't once showed me nor Alice where your still was." And no one would have expected him to, either. "Now our still, it's right there at our cabin, and since you're coming to the cabin, you're going to see our still. But we can't have you knowing how to get there on your own."

Silly concern. Jesse Duke wasn't going to show up one day with an axe to bust up Molly's still, even if she was, technically, a competitor. But a nod of a grizzled white head meant the logic was deemed sound. Jesse had just agreed to let himself be blindfolded for the rest of the trip, so Daisy did the same. It made the remainder of the ride into the swamp less distressing, anyway.

Days in the swamp were sultry, and not in a romance novel way. The air, both inside and outside of Molly's cabin, just about shimmered with heat and sweat. What had seemed like a good-neighborly idea was more like a clammier, buggier version of what it had been like to host Molly and Alice at the farm – crowded, loud, lacking privacy. And there wasn't all that much that needed doing, when it came down to it. No livestock to care for – the mysterious nephews were supposed to bring a goat and some chickens into the swamp next week sometime – a tiny house that took all of half a day to clean up, a kitchen where Molly held court and cooked up some fine crawfish bisque and other than keeping Jesse in there with her to peel the shells off the critters, she didn't let anyone else in.

Daisy was ready to leave within a day, but it took a couple extra for Jesse to talk Molly into blindfolding them taking them back out to a neutral part of the swamp. And even when she did, Molly drew out the goodbyes as long as she could, hanging onto the sill of Jesse's window and giving him directions he didn't need to get back home from where he was.

Finally, they were on their way back home and not a moment too soon – she thought that Bo and Luke had probably wrecked the house by then. Besides, she had a new mission, thought up during those pointless, sweaty hours spent in the swamp. Irma and Joey, Poison Ivy's grandchildren, needed a good home while their parents were in jail. Something better than the orphanage. She started straight in on Jesse as soon as they were alone. Got a frown and a shaken head that were hard to interpret, but she figured that if he could see their little faces, Jesse could be swayed...

And she spent the second half of that first week tracking down what had happened to the little ones, only to find that they had a perfectly wonderful home with Kevin's ex-wife over in Placid somewhere. Which meant they didn't need rescuing and left Daisy to her own devices.

She'd barely settled into the blissful peace of having her own room again, when the second week after Bo's kidnapping came whirling into their lives, full of heavy demands and light sympathy. Rosco's ijitted and wijitted objections aside, the state police had taken over investigating the case against Poison Ivy and her family, so previously-answered questions had to be answered all over again. One at a time in the sheriff's office, which had been commandeered by the state boys, over more whimpered and whined protests. Each Duke telling their own tales of what they had seen and done, while Rosco stood outside and loudly threatened anyone and everyone within earshot.

A detective called Schenk was the unfortunate investigator who got yanked out of his element and plopped down into Hazzard, where he growled at things he didn't understand. Which was anything to do with why anyone would ever go out in the wilderness for any reason at all, let alone to trying to trap some crooks that were likely to follow them there. And why Luke would have concocted a plan instead of just telling Rosco his suspicions. Poor man, with his regulation haircut and starched uniform, was probably used to investigating robberies or homicides or something – the kind of thing that didn't happen in Hazzard, and he probably didn't understand that, either – but he liked Daisy well enough. Spoke to her kindly, listened to her answers with a smile and a nod. Meanwhile outside the office, Rosco was screaming, _All right Bo Duke, you can't chew gum in this office_ with Bo sassing back, _Since when?_ and Jesse most likely getting ready to threaten them both with a whipping if they didn't hush up. Detective Schenk didn't have the first idea what to make of any of it, but it was easier to try to talk to him than it would have been to go through this same line of questioning with Enos.

Enos… who was notably missing from the sheriff's station each day of that week, when the Duke family dutifully showed up for questioning. At first she was worried that he'd somehow gotten fired over the whole mess, but it turned out that he was just out on patrol a lot. According to Bo and Luke, who sometimes slipped away from the confines of the courthouse to drive around, Enos was mostly to be found in the junk yard. Lord knew what he did there.

Ultimately, Detective Schenk's favorable disposition toward her was useful, if a touch strange.

"Not sure how important it is what you say," he confessed the second time he interviewed her, with an awkward wink and a tug at his tight uniform collar. "Since Bob Donnelly," right, Velma's husband, "is likely to turn state's witness and do all your testifying for you. But let's get back to what you were saying about Clem Clemmons holding Mr. Hogg at gunpoint…"

So she told him what he wanted to know, more or less, leaving out anything that had to do with moonshine. _Daisy's smart enough to know what not to say to him_ – that was what Jesse had said, way back in those sepia days (that were really only a month earlier and yet they had that distant feeling to them, almost as if they had happened to someone else) when she was so gleefully dating Enos. It was true then and it was true now. She talked to the detective about everything and nothing all at once, and none of what she said turned out to matter. But that part came later.

The third week after Bo had been kidnapped, the Dukes' new barn finally got built. Much as Enos had long-ago predicted, Uncle Jesse announced the barn-raising plans in church on a Sunday, with the festivities to take place on Wednesday. Which meant a whole lot of cooking (for both her and Jesse, because folks both ate and drank far too much at these kinds of things) for the first half of the week. And then, like he'd once promised, Enos showed up with the rest of the town's able-bodied folks to complete the task. Which meant a whole lot of smiling and flirting with any guy young enough to flirt back, even if she would rather have locked herself away in her room.

But that was the other thing she had learned those days spent talking to Detective Schenk. One morning, when she'd arrived a few minutes earlier than her ten o'clock interview appointment, she'd overheard the detective and Rosco talking in his office.

"She's a looker, that Daisy is," Schenk had said.

"Don't you let old Jesse hear you say that or he'll give you a tongue lashing, lawman or no," Rosco had counseled. And then he'd giggled. "She does have legs that could stop a man's heart, though."

"And what a way to go," the detective had added.

It had been, she'd decided after the perfectly professional interview had been completed and she'd sat out in the hot summer sun, tanning and waiting for Bo and Luke to pick her up, a compliment. A strange and slightly unsettling compliment, but a compliment all the same that two older man had found her attractive. It gave her confidence, anyway.

So she flirted with other boys in front of Enos, for no reason she could properly explain to anyone at all, but it didn't matter, because no one asked. The men just flirted right back, while Luke stood a careful distance away and flexed his muscles a bit. It was a win-win situation: no man touched her with her proective cousin standing around, but the women enjoyed the little show that Luke was putting on.

In the fourth week, not a whole lot happened, but come the fifth week, J.D. Hogg made a real nuisance of himself. The local elections were bearing down on Hazzard like a runaway train, and J.D.'s mouth was doing everything it could to keep up with the momentum. When facts eluded him, he settled for spewing nonsense. And some of that nonsense had him coming to the rescue of the Dukes on that early August morning, single-handedly fighting off the Poison Ivy gang and rescuing a barely conscious Bo Duke, while Bo's dumbfounded family stood around and watched is grateful awe.

Even Uncle Jesse, who had defended his one-time friend throughout the entire summer, wouldn't sit still for that. One rainy afternoon when it seemed like half the county was squeezed into the Boar's Nest all at once, sweating and drinking in equal measure, J.D. Hogg climbed up on the roadhouse stage and told his glorious tale. The Dukes sat together at a small, side table with their bland drinks leaving wet rings of condensation on the checked tablecloth, Bo shoving handfuls of dry popcorn into his mouth at odd intervals, listening to the man stump for votes. Long about the time those frizzy strings of dull gray hair were dripping sweat and his pudgy cheeks glowed pink with exertion, J.D. got around to saying he could save Hazzard from fiscal crisis, just like he'd saved Bo Duke from dastardly kidnappers.

Their uncle gripped Bo's forearm to keep him from shouting out how it had really gone. Luke sat back with his hands behind his head, and Daisy bit her tongue until it was just about shredded.

"Mr. Hogg," Jesse interjected when the story seemed to have wound itself around into something approximating a lovely white bow, fit for the top of a Christmas present. "Reckon I've got a few questions about that yarn you've been spinning."

The blustering started up then and built into a blizzard of excuses about how little time the prospective county commissioner had to spare to the cause of historical accuracy when, really, he had a whole platform to present. But Jesse was stubborn in his insistence that his own recollection of events didn't exactly tally with Hogg's. Faster than a rattlesnake strike, her uncle was on his feet and the two men were belly-to-belly, hollering a few things out about who had rescued whom. J.D. was still on wood of the platform, and Jesse stood on the concrete floor, which made them about even height, red face matching red face until Daisy figured it'd take half the men in town and an oversized pry bar to separate them. By the time it was done, everyone in the Boar's Nest had learned quite a bit more than they had bargained for about one Jefferson Davis Hogg's role in the whole Poison Ivy incident.

Not that it mattered. During the sixth week after the whole mess happened, the county of Hazzard had elected themselves a new commissioner. It wasn't much of a choice, really. The candidates were Chadwick, a beloved oldster who could no longer talk sense, much less govern, and Hogg, a gluttonous liar who was sharp as a tack, especially when it came to lining his own bottomless pockets. The first election in which Daisy and Bo were old enough to vote, and she almost didn't feel like bothering. But oh, her ear just about fell right off her head for all the words Jesse shouted into it when she confessed her lack of interest. A whole twelve years of schooling condensed down into a powerful lecture about civic duty and the rights and responsibilities of being a citizen, with a side order of guilt and a reminder how her own grandmother had been a suffragette for dessert. It was a full meal.

So she voted, not for Commissioner Chadwick, and not for J.D. Hogg. She wrote in Uncle Jesse's name, even though she knew he didn't want the job. He'd be better at it than either of the two men that were running.

And if he was a little more grown up, if he'd shown good judgement when it came to the events of the past summer, she would have written in Enos' name instead. She would have told all her friends and family to do the same, and she would have proudly hosted a fine celebration for him when he won. But that was only in her dreams, where she could trust Enos, where she would still be his girlfriend and it would be her hand that he held in his when he gave his acceptance speech.

Instead, it was J.D. Hogg who won and she didn't think there was much of anyone who'd want to hold his hand, sticky as it was with leftover candy, coated in the stench of old cigars. He gave his acceptance speech all the same, and managed to sound more pompous than grateful, dubbing himself "Boss Hogg" before the inaugural address was even halfway over.

Somewhere around the seventh week, the state of Georgia decided there was enough evidence to try the Poison Ivy gang.

The state's star witness, Bob Donnelly, was promised minimal punishment for his cooperation. He was almost sent to prison anyway, when Ivy, Velma, Kevin and Jeremy decided to plead guilty and avoid a jury trial. But there was still Clem Clemmons, too tough or too stubborn to cop a plea, so Bob Donnelly got to tell the tale after all. How Ivy had her nephews and daughter get temporary jobs in Hazzard, how Ivy herself had gotten mail-order, forged credentials that said she was qualified to be a librarian. How they'd infiltrated town to keep an eye on the Dukes, how they'd figured that Jeremy and Kevin's jobs in the garage would probably provide the best vantage point for observation, though it was Daisy and Enos' romance in the library had taken center stage.

Ivy had a thing for Uncle Jesse. She'd had hopes, Bob reported, of mending whatever fences needed to be mended, and joining him in the trade. (And maybe, if all went well, joining him in holy matrimony. Seemed like Clem Clemmons hadn't known that part; he'd gone tense across the shoulders when it came out in court.) She'd sent her nephews and Velma and Bob out to chase the Dukes on moonshine runs, so Jesse would be more likely to want a partner.

Unlike the Dukes (and unlike Detective Schenk, who'd barked at Rosco about his inability to track down two particular witnesses to the crime), Ivy apparently knew exactly where Molly's cabin was, and had ever since a dispute she'd gotten into with Molly's mother back in the 1930s. So when she'd set to harassing the Dukes, she'd known exactly where to send her nephews to scare Molly, with intent to keep her in the swamp and away from Jesse.

Kevin and Jeremy had only half listened to Ivy's instructions (which didn't surprise Daisy one bit – men were terrible at listening comprehension and following directions) so they'd burned the Dukes' barn and chased Molly right out of the swamp and into Jesse Duke's arms.

After that, the gloves had come off. Ivy had taken a strong disliking to Daisy and Enos' relationship, on the premise that no self-respecting moonshiner should get romantically involved with the law. Furthermore, she was affronted by what she thought was Jesse and Molly's budding relationship, so Jeremy, Kevin, Velma and Bob had been turned loose to wreak whatever manner of havoc they wanted upon the Dukes.

Meanwhile, J.D. Hogg had figured out exactly who Ivy was the first time he made his campaigning rounds into the library. He'd offered to help her in her quest to snare Uncle Jesse. At the trial, he made promises as large as his round belly that he'd only meant to help her achieve her romantic goals, not her destructive ones. He'd never known a single thing about what she'd had her nephews do, and he was sure that the Dukes' barn had burned of "natural causes." Whatever that was supposed to mean.

A jury of his peers found Clem Clemmons guilty of a few different crimes, none of which included kidnapping one Bo Duke. There just wasn't any proof linking him to that part of what had happened. But holding the man who was now commissioner of Hazzard County at gunpoint, well, he got ten years for that alone. When the sentencing was done for every crime of which he was convicted, Daisy calculated that he's be in jail until she was a grandmother.

Then, in the ninth week after Bo's kidnapping, just when she reckoned her life would settle back into something like normal, everything changed all over again. One bright and crisp midday when the air smelled of wood smoke and ripe apples, Rosco Coltrane showed up on the Dukes' doorstep. Hat in his hands, he crossed the threshold and set to hiccuping, stammering and sputtering about how he needed Jesse Duke's help right now. He hadn't always been friends with the Dukes, maybe he'd arrested them a time or two, but he'd never known Jesse to abandon a man in need—

"Rosco, what on God's green earth are you going on about?" Jesse had snapped. Rosco shuffled on his feet, making the kitchen floorboards creak, while Daisy had studiously stirred the baked beans and Luke set the table.

"Lulu," could as easily as anything have been more babbling. Except there was a follow-up: "And J.D. Hogg."

Bo snickered from over by the sink, scrubbing his hands for the upcoming meal. To which sympathy dictated that Rosco would soon receive an invitation.

Jesse offered up a dark glare to Bo's turned back, and Luke kept his face carefully neutral, like he always did when dealing with the law. Or when he didn't want to get dragged into Bo's messes. "What about Lulu and J.D. Hogg, Rosco?" her uncle asked with the same patience he'd use on a scared child or a cantankerous mule.

"They're getting married!" Rosco blurted.

Funny how Luke dropped the ceramic plate he'd been setting at Bo's place with a resounding thump. Bo turned around, slack-jawed, wet hands dripping everywhere but down into the sink. Those two always thought they knew everything, but they didn't.

"When?" Daisy asked. No time to worry about her stunned cousins when there were breathless images of toile and taffeta and tall, white wedding cakes flashing behind her eyes. Baked beans were still bubbling in front of her, smelling vinegary with an edge of burnt sugar. But her thoughts were a million miles away, wrapped in crepe paper and dried rice and hand-lettered _Just Married_ signs followed by the clanking of tin cans tied to a bumper.

"When?" Rosco snapped right back at her, like it was a fool's question, but it wasn't. There was one heck of a lot of planning to be done before a girl could get married. Even if the girl was well past the age of forty. "Too soon!"

Jesse draped a comforting arm around Rosco, patting his uniform-clad shoulder and saying something about fools and love, and how there was no reasoning with them when they thought getting married was a good idea.

Rosco settled down eventually, ate himself some beans. Pouted over how he was being advised to reconcile himself to having J.D. Hogg as a brother-in-law when he'd sought co-conspirators in making sure that nothing of the sort ever happened.

Fools and love… Daisy couldn't swear how she felt about those words, but it didn't matter, because sweet Lulu Coltrane married conniving old Boss Hogg all the same on the Saturday afternoon that fell exactly eleven weeks after Bo had been kidnapped.

The weather was chilly with a hair-frizzing mist, but the dual whites of Lulu's dress and J.D. Hogg's suit stood out in dashing contrast to the gloom of the skies. Lulu's hands were clamped tightly together, holding her bouquet of white roses and baby's breath down low by her round belly as she slow stepped her way across the green of Hazzard Square with the train of her dress being carried by the girlish Tillingham twins, Maybelle's younger sisters, who seemed too slender and small to handle all that material. By the time Lulu made it halfway to the gazebo, her satin shoes were stained with grass and dirt, and Boss Hogg was getting snappish and impatient. Maybe because he wasn't allowed to have a cigar in his hands during the ceremony, and all the sweets were over in the Boar's Nest waiting for the reception, leaving the poor man with nothing but his own fingernails to put into his mouth. Lulu quit her slow-stepping and walked right up into the gazebo after J.D. barked at her to hurry it along.

Most of Hazzard was there to watch, standing in their best clothes and fine leather shoes in the damp grass. Bo and Luke were twitching like it was so hard to stand still and behave, but they were just silly boys.

Daisy couldn't say whether Lulu and J.D. were fools, but they were obviously in love. The wedding was beautiful. Lulu swooned unsteadily when Boss promised to cherish her until death, and J.D. even smiled, once or twice. A few people looked like they might object when the preacher offered them the opportunity, and the only one who cried was Rosco.

The reception was at The Boar's Nest; of course it was. Free rent for the groom, two-dollar beer that was suspiciously foamy for the guests, a stage at one end for the new Commissioner to hold court. The pile of gifts mounting on the bar as the afternoon wore on was a toppling heap of bribes, or at least pleas for mercy. Hogg was in his own heaven.

So was Lulu, though her heaven might have looked a little different from her new husband's. The dreams in her head were full of romance and love. Daisy figured they'd have to be, to marry someone like J.D. Hogg. She must see something in him that no one else could. (Gold – that's what cynical Luke would have said her dreams were full of – spending Boss Hogg's money, while he tried with all ten fingers and most of his toes not to let any of it get spent.)

The reception wasn't formal, no one had a champagne glass or a fork to clink against it, no one toasted the bride and groom. There was just J.D. Hogg on his own stage, mentioning that donations to the wedding fund would be gladly accepted by his new brother-in-law, Rosco, who was compelled to stand by the door holding a plastic bucket which would have been better used to mop the floor. (And if J.D. wanted to start a collection to send himself on a distant honeymoon, that bucket might actually fill up with more than a few loose pennies.) Someone must have decided that a quarter would be better donated to the jukebox than to Boss Hogg's fortune, because after a while the music started up.

The Dukes had been standing together, waiting in what would have been the receiving line, if only the Commissioner would stop jabbering and start letting himself be congratulated. When the music began to blare there was no point in pretending they were going to talk to Boss and Lulu – or that they'd be heard if they did. Bo was the first to wander off, hollering something about pretty fillies in their Sunday best, and someone had to make the grand sacrifice and dance with them. Luke followed after because he couldn't let Bo suffer such an arduous task all on his own.

That left her standing there next to Jesse, feeling like a little girl clinging close to her father a big crowd. She was thinking that she'd better find someone to dance with, quick, when a tapping came on her shoulder.

"Miss Daisy," was the most formal Enos had sounded since that day when she'd still been a pony-tailed girl, dripping hose-water out of the strings of an old pair of cut-off jeans in the high school parking lot. Felt like years ago. "Might I have the pleasure of a dance?"

What could she do? Look to her uncle or cousins to get her out of it? No. The one thing she'd been trying to do all summer long, in every way she could think of, it was grow up. To be mature enough to take care of herself.

"Thank you," she said, running her hands down the skirt of her dress. Probably looked like a graceless country girl, wiping sweat off her palms. She tried not to care what he thought of her as he took her hand to lead her to the dance floor.

Enos had big feet. Seemed strange to get around to noticing it this late in the game, but there they were in those shiny brown shoes. She shouldn't be looking down at them, should be meeting his eyes, but if she didn't watch, her toes might get stepped on. That was her excuse, if anyone ever asked.

"You're looking well, Daisy."

Almost made her want to cry – those words were so courteous, perfectly polite and crushingly civil. Like she was just another girl from town that Enos knew only well enough to offer toekn kindness.

"Thank you," she whispered. Because when all else failed, she at least had manners. And if the music covered up the broken sound of her voice, it was all the better. He could see her lips move, anyway.

Things were a mite crowded, not much space to move. If she shuffled closer to Enos there'd be a bunch fewer shoulders knocking into the both of them—

No. She wasn't going to do a dang foolish thing like getting close to Enos all over again.

"I like your hair," he piped up over the music. She'd spent some time with her friend Sally Jo that morning, pulling it straight with a borrowed blow dryer, then using a flowery spray to try to hold it that way against the moisture of the day. It felt like a helmet on her head, but she thought it made her look more like herself than she had all summer long. "It was nice how you wore it different this summer, but I reckon I like it best when it's long."

It was right about then that Luke cut in on them. Maybe he was being overprotective, maybe he was trying to keep her from getting involved with a lawman again. Maybe he was being a jerk, but she didn't know and didn't care when his arms were warm around her, and his shoulder was giving under the weight of her head when she buried it there. Luke wasn't as smart as he thought he was and he wasn't always nice, but he was family, he was safe, and he would hold onto her as long as she needed him to, until her silly tears were dry.

Until she was ready to lift her head and face the world again.

And that was what she had been doing ever since. Facing each day with forced cheer and a near-vicious energy that made her kinfolk scatter to the four corners of the house just to get away from her broom or mop or dusting wand. Being industrious helped. It gave her something to do other than think her sad thoughts, it gave her heart time to heal so that, like Bo's burned hands, it would be healthy again someday. Whole, with just a few scars and rough edges.

Come October, when Bo informed her that if she scrubbed the walls one more time, she might scrub right through the thin plaster to the outside world, she'd gone out and gotten herself a job. Took her own advice, what she'd told Enos to do back in July. She went to the Hazzard Library and said she wanted to work there, and funny thing if she wasn't hired within the week. Evenings only, replacing Maybelle Tillingham, who'd moved over to being the switchboard operator. Emma Tisdale was haunting the stacks during the day, hushing the high school students who had returned with questions about resources for term papers. She handed over the keys and the reins to Daisy each night at five. It was most active then, parents bringing in younger children to look at picture books, the older students studying near the back. All in all, it was a pretty nice place to work.

But it wasn't what she'd imagined when she'd been searching for a job over the summer. It was boring and repetitive, and it wasn't any fun to work right in the middle of town now that she didn't have a boyfriend to meet for picnic dinners. Besides, her heart gave a little pang every time she walked up the concrete steps, over that hail-pocked porch, under the rusty candle holder, past the nook and into the door.

When she got inside, she'd straighten her back and swear to herself that she wasn't going to feel bad anymore.

"Plenty of fish in the sea," Edna Tisdale sometimes said. (Of course, she usually followed that up with some kind of declaration about how Jesse Duke was the only one around worth baiting a hook for.) Daisy figured that was true, and even if Hazzard was more of a pond, or maybe just a big puddle in the grand scheme of things, she resolved herself to stop thinking of Enos.

Which was why she'd come out here this afternoon, to the dead cornfields of her uncle's farm. To bury what was gone. To grow up, to forgive, to let go. To unhook Enos from her line and turn him loose, and hope that he thrived out there in the sea (or pond or puddle) of life.

And wonder if he would feel a small tug at the corner of his mouth every now and then when he thought of her.


End file.
